A History of Western Astrology Volume II The Medieval and Modern Worlds

Astrology is a major feature of contemporary popular culture. Recent research indicates that 99% of adults in the modern west know their birth sign. In the modern west astrology thrives as part of our culture despite being a pre-Christian, pre-scientific world-view.

Medieval and Renaissance Europe marked the high water mark for astrology. It was a subject of high theological speculation, was used to advise kings and popes, and to arrange any activity from the beginning of battles to the most auspicious time to have one’s hair cut.

Nicholas Campion examines the foundation of modern astrology in the medieval and Renaissance worlds. Spanning the period between the collapse of classical astrology in the fifth century and the rise of popular astrology on the web in the twentieth, Campion challenges the historical convention that astrology flourished only between the twelfth and seventeenth centuries.
Concluding with a discussion of astrology’s popularity and appeal in the twenty-first century, Campion asks whether it should be seen as an integral part of modernity or as an element of the post-modern world.

1. The Early Medieval World
2. The Twelfth Century Renaissance
3. The Thirteenth Century: Magic and Politics
4. Medieval Cosmology
5. The High Middle Ages
6. The Fifteenth Century: the pagan revival
7. Reform and Revolution
8. Renaissance Magic
9. The Seventeenth Century: the Last Flowering Decline
10. The Newtonian Revolution
11. The Esoteric Enlightenment
12. The Radical Sky
13. The Revival of Horoscopic Astrology
14. The Theosophical Enlightenment
15. The Psychological Cosmos
16. Astrology in Popular Culture
17. Science and Scepticism
18. Astrology as a Modern Religion
19. Astrology and the Post-Modern Condition