Scorpio Traits

Scorpio, the Scor­pion, is the eighth sign of the Zo­di­ac. The sun enters it on or around October 23, when the autumn arrives. Scorpio belongs to the ele­ment water, its quality is fixed and its charge is negative. Its Ruler is Pluto, and Neptune exalts in it. Its motto is: "I wish."

     In the horo­scope chart, Scorpio brings a mysterious and unsettling charac­ter to planets or Houses therein.

Your Scorpio Star Sign Traits

Those who have Scorpio as their star sign are born when the sun was in Scorpio, normally Oc­tober 23 - No­vember 21 (it differs slightly from year to year, be­cause of the leap years). There­fore, it is also - more correctly - called the sun sign.

     The sun in your horoscope is your natural self - what you are when you relax, when other planets in your horoscope are not active. It's your basic drive, a character you have as an ingredient - more or less evident in all you do and all you are.

     The sun is the most important point in your horoscope chart, but of course it's not the only thing that describes your personality. You need to look at all the components of your birth chart, to get a correct astrological description of your­self.

Excited by the Hidden

If your sun sign is Scorpio, you're a secretive person, who enjoys strong emotions lived out through others - but you keep yourself quite restrained. A key word for Scorpio is passion, but it must be understood that passion is so strong a feeling that it can hardly be expressed. It's suppressed. Under the surface and deep inside, that's where your passion roams.

     Still, this is what makes you trigger others to live it out. You make them feel your inner turmoil without knowing its origin, which makes them confused and anxious.

     You enjoy the mysterious and the incom­pre­hensible, bringing spices and excitement to life. You crave to make your wishes come true, more like magic than by concrete action of yours, no matter how unlikely that is. You also have a taste for the bizarre. To you, life is wonderfully mysterious.

Three Different Scorpio

A Zodiac sign doesn't give exactly the same influ­ence all through its 30°. Its first third has something of a cardinal quality, whatever the quality of the sign as a whole is, its second third is slightly more fixed in quality, and the last third is more mutable.

     If you were born at the end of October, the sun is in the beginning of Scorpio. Then you're very good at having other people live out your feelings, and it pleases you tremendously. You are mysterious, and enjoy making others confused by it.

     If you were born in the beginning of November, the sun is in the middle of Scorpio. Then you keep all your emotions inside of you, and let people know very little about what you feel. You are secretive, but enjoy what people might guess about you - as long as they're not accu­rate. Since this is the fixed part of the sign and the Scorpio quality is fixed, those with their sun here are the most typical Scorpios, with most of its traits. That means they are excellent at hiding what's going on inside of them. So, they can be spotted, not by what they show, but by all they hide.

     If you were born in the middle of November, the sun is at the end of Scorpio. In this case you're worried about your own feelings, fearing that you might not be able to suppress them enough to keep them hidden. Therefore, you get a bit intimidated when others let their feelings out - although you really want them to. You worry that their emotional outbursts might ignite yours. To you, the world is a dangerous place. You trust no one, not even yourself.

Traits of Your Father

The sun in the horoscope also represents your father (the mother is represented by the moon). That means your Zodiac sign traits reveal something about the characteristics of your relationship with your father.

     If you have the sun in Scorpio, your relation to your father is one of uncertainty and inexplicable tension. None of you shows it, but there are worries and frust­rations between you, as well as countless questions never asked aloud. You know how to play on your father's emotions, causing numbers of his outbursts, and that you do enjoy. But your father, too, knows how to get on your nerves. You rarely argue with each other, at least not loudly, but there is mostly an impres­sion that it can happen any minute. Although you irritate each other frequently, you still enjoy each other's company - maybe mostly for the thrill of it.

Traits of the Planets in Scorpio

When another planet or other point of the horo­scope is in Scorpio, it's also affected by the Zodiac sign, get­ting some of its traits. Here are those astrological points, what they stand for in the horoscope, and how they are affected by Scorpio:


Sun   basic drive - Scorpio brings secrecy and inner passion.

Moon   longing - Scorpio brings a need for excite­ment and the unexpected.

Mercury   curiosity - Scorpio brings confusing thoughts and speaking between the lines.

Venus   affection - Scorpio brings an attraction for the bizarre and a talent for fascinating others.

Mars   aggression - Scorpio brings destructive im­pulses and a temper that others dread.

Jupiter   luck - Scorpio brings surprises, both good and bad, but always intense.

Saturn   duty - Scorpio brings strange morals, or none, and many complications.

Uranus   contemplation - Scorpio brings an under­standing of the incomprehensible, and an interest in anything mysterious.

Neptune   fantasy - Scorpio brings a weird imagi­nation, and a rich fantasy favoring the unthinkable.

Pluto   catharsis - Scorpio brings a sense of doom, but little evident change, and still a kind of metamor­phosis.

Ascendant, AC   attitude - Scorpio brings a secretive, intriguing attitude.

Medium Coeli, MC   self-image - Scorpio brings a sense of being unable to understand oneself, and kind of enjoying it.

Traits of the Houses in Scorpio

In the astrological Houses, the Zodiac signs also bring their character traits, influencing the environments de­scribed by the Houses. Here are the twelve Houses of the horoscope, what they stand for, and how Scorpio affects them:

1. Identity - Scorpio makes you seem secretive and complicated.
2. Resources - Scorpio makes your material situ­ation insecure.
3. Communication - Scorpio makes you unknown to your friends, and your studies confused.
4. Home - Scorpio makes your home a bit strange and your family edgy.
5. Pastime - Scorpio makes you lustful and your pastimes odd.
6. Work - Scorpio makes your work peculiar and your skills unusual.
7. Partners - Scorpio makes your relations passio­nate, but also tense.
8. Unknown - Scorpio makes you fascinated by the mysterious and the unpredictable.
9. Travel - Scorpio makes you both long for and fear changes in life, and you travel to exotic places.
10. Career - Scorpio makes you a constant wild card in your social setting, your goals a mystery to others.
11. Ideals - Scorpio makes you have little belief in ideals, and the ones you have are unconven­tional.
12. Shortcomings - Scorpio makes it hard for you to keep things to yourself, and to live out your passions.

Generalizations

Of course, all of the above is very general, mainly to give you an idea of how the Zodiac sign traits affect the horoscope. You need to study your horoscope chart carefully, to make a deeper and more nuanced inter­pretation.

Scorpio, illustration from a 1482 edition of a book by Hyginus.
© Stefan Stenudd