Dwarf Planet Ceres, Part I
The Great Mother Archetype in Astrology
I have been incorporating some of the dwarf planets and asteroids into astrology readings lately, and while the placement in an individual birth chart often coincides in literal ways with the person’s life, these celestial bodies are fascinating on their own. I have previously written about dwarf planet Sedna, which related to empowerment and transcendence to a higher state of consciousness.
This piece focuses on dwarf planet Ceres: the astronomy, the mythology, and finally the astrological correspondences. I find that this full context enables a richer interpretation of the role of Ceres in the current highly dynamic and complex astrology.
I am breaking this into two parts, and in the next installment, I will dive into the correspondences of Ceres in the individual birth chart.
Astronomy.
I must say, if I had to choose which US institution Elonald spares between NASA and Social Security, I might have to choose NASA. Although Ceres was discovered in 1801, NASA’s Dawn Orbiter mission (2007 - 2018) to asteroid Vesta and dwarf planet Ceres taught us much more about this dwarf planet and our solar system.
You may recall the stink when Pluto was demoted in 2006. Well, 200 years prior, Ceres, Pallas, Juno, and Vesta, were demoted from planet status, as astronomers caught on that there were going to be too many of these bodies to label them all as planets.
Ceres is the closest dwarf planet to Earth and the largest object in the Kaipur belt between Mars and Jupiter, composing 35% of this main asteroid belt’s mass. Ceres looks like the mother of the other objects in the Kaipur belt because she is so much larger, and this mother archetype will come into play in the mythology and astrological correspondences.
Ceres orbit around the Sun is 4.6 Earth years, and it makes a near circular orbit, as opposed to our Earth’s elliptical orbit.
It has a complex terrain of older and newer topographies, including a surface of hydrated salts, rocks, clathrates (gas molecules trapped in a cage of water molecules), and abundant ice at higher altitudes. Dawn made several discoveries which yielded new thinking about water-rich bodies, such as some of the icy moons orbiting the gas giants.
Ceres is believed to come from the outer solar system, indicating that our solar system went through some rejiggering before reaching the current arrangement.
Mythology (summarized from the book Asteroid Goddesses by Demetra George and Douglas Bloch).
The Roman goddess Ceres was originally known as Demeter in Greek mythology (from the ancient form da mater for Earth mother). In the Olympian pantheon, she was a daughter (along with Juno and Vesta) of Saturn and Rhea, who also had sons Jupiter (Zeus), Neptune, and Pluto. The siblings became the ruling family of ancient Greece.
Ceres inhabited both the heavens and the earth with humanity, bestowing the gifts of grain and the Eleusinian Rites (also called Eleusinian Mysteries). She symbolized the fertile soil which allowed for humanity to be provided for and fed, and was worshipped for her nurturance.
Of course, the mythology must contain a scandal and/or tragedy if it is to endure. In Homer’s Hymn to Demeter, the story goes that Ceres was so happy wandering the Earth with her daughter Persephone, that as Goddess of the Harvest, she blessed the Earth with an eternal season of harvest or the Golden Age. However, she was extremely possessive of her daughter Persephone, thinking no man was ever good enough to marry her.
Pluto became obsessed with Persephone and one day when she was out picking flowers (particularly enamored with the narcissus blooms), he abducted her, ravished her, and took her to the Underworld to become his wife and queen.
With the help of the witch Hecate, Ceres learned from Helios (the sun god and seer) that Zeus had secretly approved the marriage. Ceres was so angry she withdrew from Mt. Olympus, disguised her true identity, and wandered as a bereaved old woman.
The situation was looking dire, as humanity would suffer famine if Ceres was not appeased. Humans prayed to Zeus to intervene, and Zeus realized that without humans, there would be no one to worship the gods. Yikes!
Eventually, Hermes (Mercury) was sent to the Underworld to demand Persephone’s release, but Pluto had tricked her into consenting to be his wife forever. When Ceres learned of this trickery, she once again refused to life her curse. However, Zeus and mother Rhea negotiated a deal whereby Persephone would spend 6 months of each year in the Underworld, alternating with 6 months on earth.
This led to Earth’s Spring and Summer, during which time everything may grow, and then become fallow in Autumn and Winter. Ceres could never accept that her daughter was not entirely hers. This myth was central to the Eleusinian Rites and was told for thousands of years. The Eleusinian Rites initiated people into the divine worship of Ceres, and addressed human concern with death by taking them through a mysterious passage of death and rebirth while they were alive. (I can make a connection between our society’s fear of death and aversion to aging. We have lost rituals of grief and acquired “anti-aging” products instead).
This myth will also be reflected in the significations that have accumulated as we have had more experience with Ceres through the signs relative to what has happened on Earth and in individuals charts.
Astrological Correspondences.
The timing of our awareness of Ceres’ existence in the sky and accumulated astrological correlations of Ceres position relative to historical events are aligned to: the suffrage movement in the 1800s, women entering the workforce, latch key children, divorce, single motherhood, custody arrangements, food related complexes, and diet culture.
I find it interesting that the latest discoveries on Ceres’ composition, her ‘body’, came to us via the Dawn Mission in 2015 - 2016, when there was a third wave of “body positivity” occurring. In an echo of the suffrage movement, the first woman was running for US president.
Ceres and Pluto meet in the Sky
Many astrologers are tracking Pluto’s impact from Aquarius, and given the relationship of Pluto and Ceres in mythology, I thought it would be interesting to look at the Sabian symbols for Ceres and Pluto’s meetings. Below are the symbols for their meetings last year and this year, with an initial interpretation. I took a peek at the symbols for 2026 and 2027 meetings, and they are equally compelling. More on those in a future post. (DR = Dane Rudhyar, from his book An Astrological Mandala.)
12/8/24 conjunction (this type of aspect drives a fusion of energy), at Aquarius 00°
An old adobe mission in California.
Keynote: The power inherent in all great human worlds to endure far beyond the workers’ life spans.
DR: “It speaks to us of the concretization of an ideal. This also implies the “immortalization” of an individual within a great collective and cultural enterprise.” At the time the symbols were channeled (1925), this symbol was believed to be a reference to a noble ideal of faith (the Catholic missionaries) becoming something enduring and beautiful (the mission buildings). We would interpret this differently now, as a physical representation of something whose original purpose requires a more evolved perspective.
5/28/25 sextile (this type of aspect facilitates the expression of mutual excitation, productivity)
Ceres at Aries 03°
Two lovers strolling on a secluded walk.
Keynote: The progressive polarization of energies needed for fulfilling one’s life function.
DR describes the requirement of bipolar energies to create resonance working in a dynamic manner, moving apart and back together in contact with the surrounding energies of nature, also: “It introduces the base means - one might say , the technique - to establish consciousness in the world of duality.”
This harkens to Ceres and Persephone being apart and together, and in the present world, to the extreme polarization. We neglect to come back together from the poles to create harmony, and forget that nature is part of that harmony.
Pluto at Aq 03°
A Hindu yogi demonstrates his healing powers.
Keynote: The disciplined use of spiritual energies in restoring the natural harmony disturbed by man’s inharmonic attempts to transcend nature through mind.
DR: “The goal of a true civilization - Western civilization being largely a caricature of it - is the development of a humanity composed of self-motivated and responsible individuals freely associating … fully actualizing the potentialities inherent in the archetype, MAN.”
This is a complex symbol that speaks to the full archetype of human, which includes the integration of wisdom that we are at once an individual yet we are not separate from source and all that is. It speaks of a duty of those individuals who have worked to personally integrate this spiritual nature to help those who are not there yet.
The timing of this sextile meeting is significant, as Venus will be concluding her retrograde period and will have completed her 8 year journey to the point of the star (or rose) shape she makes, at 2° Aries on 3/22/25, perhaps foreshadowing Ceres energy from just one degree away two months later.
The symbol for Venus’s star point cazimi is 3° Aries :
The cameo profile of a man, suggesting the shape of his country.
Keynote: The sustaining power of the Whole, as the individual identifies themselves with Its life.
This symbol incorporates the themes of the symbols for the Ceres and Pluto sextile, speaking to human transcendence from individual representation of one’s environment to becoming an agent of the universe to express itself in an outward manifestation for the highest good of the collective.
On a darker note, it brought to mind Trump’s statement about being added to Mt. Rushmore.
I would love to hear your thoughts about Ceres, please drop in a comment!
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I loved learning this!
Mythology is so fascinating.