A walk through 2000 years of Pluto in Aquarius
On March 23, two days past the Aries Equinox, beginning of the Solar Year, and one day past the Aries New Moon, beginning of the Lunar Year, Pluto made its first tentative step into Aquarius. It will return to Capricorn on June 11, re-enter Aquarius on January 21, 2024, and then reverse back into Capricorn on September 2, 2024, but only for a matter of weeks. The ingress will be complete on November 20 2024 (AEST), Pluto then remaining in Aquarius until 2044. This prolonged Pluto’s Sign change is the ninth since the beginning of the Christian era.
The present to and fro on the cusp of Aquarius shows that this cosmic shift is not yet accomplished. The necessary and arduous dismantling of outworn structures in our collective and personal lives, challenges and opportunities represented by Pluto in Capricorn, aren’t quite over. These are crucial times indeed, when a planet like Pluto, always signalling momentous historical resets, hovers between the past and the future, compelling us to integrate the experiences of recent years, to root out what we know is hindering our evolutionary journey, to be able to face future challenges with renewed wisdom (Aquarius) and resourcefulness (Pluto). Failing this integration and conscious transformation we could be destined, as a collective, to suffer traumatic and destructive events over which we may have little or no control, especially around the time of the upcoming conjunction Saturn-Neptune on the nought degree of Aries, beginning of all beginnings, on February 21, 2026.
Aquarius and Pluto’s keywords
Here are some key words defining the qualities of Aquarius and the function of Pluto; they may help to explain what many astrologers are reading into this cyclical cosmic event.
Aquarius is linked with learning, science, rational thinking, invention, technology, humanism, equality, democracy, rebellion, revolution, sudden changes and reversals, while Pluto is the drive toward all ultimate transformations, shadow work, the discovery of inner resources, psychological and physical, planet of Death is also the planet of survival and resurrection; Phoenix type energy destroying in order to allow rebirth.
Pluto in Aquarius’ chronology
60-85: between 60 and 85 St Paul was busy spreading the Christian creed across the Roman Empire, while, while Buddhism was penetrating China.
In 61 Boudicca, appointed leader of the Celtic tribes fiercely defending their homeland from the army of Rome, was defeated, furthering the 400 years colonization of Britain by the Romans; another relatively small event that had immense unforeseen consequences.
In 64 ancient Rome burnt. In the next four years Emperor Nero, who is suspected to have lit the fire in the first place, rebuilt a new, more imperial Rome on the ashes of the old.
The volcanic eruption of Mt Vesuvius, in 79, shrouded the Roman towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum under ash and lava for centuries, to be re-discovered only in 1748.
Pompeii disappeared, a feat we can easily attribute to the God of Death, the Underworld and all hidden things, secrets and mysteries. But its discovery centuries later I attribute to Aquarius, the Sign of discoveries and seekers after knowledge and truth.
305-329: Emperor Constantine (the one of the famous vision of the ‘Cross’) made Christianity the state religion of the Roman Empire, a complete turnaround after decades of fierce Christian persecution. He also moved the capital of his empire to the the ancient Greek port of Byzantium, on the crucial route between east and west, calling it Nova Roma (New Rome). In 330, at the end of this Pluto in Aquarius period, the city came to be named Constantinople, eastern capital of the new Christian Roman Empire.
These events marked in a striking way the beginning of a complete new social, political, religious and philosophical phase, still relevant to us today.
550-574: this was the time of Roman Emperor Justinian (537-565), the last who succeeded in uniting the East and West blocks of the empire, an accomplishment that didn’t endure after his death. What we remember Justinian for, and it’s more relevant to Pluto transiting Aquarius during 15 years of his reign, is the establishment of an orderly system of Law, quite modern in concept. For instance, in cooperation with his wife, Empress Theodora, family laws gave mothers same authority as fathers over their children, a very radical idea for the time. Capital punishment was limited to very serious crimes and prison terms were viewed as opportunities for rehabilitation, not just occasions for punishment, at least in principle.
795-818: these were the times of Charlemagne, last of the ‘Barbarian’ conquerors and first to be officially crowned emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. The wheel had turned full circle: the so called ‘barbarians’ becoming God anointed rulers. A New Europe and therefore a new world was born at this time. Despite being himself illiterate Charlemagne promoted education throughout Europe, founding important centers of learning.
1041-1063: in 1049 a permanent split (schism) occurred between the Papist Catholic Church of Western Europe and the Orthodox Church of Eastern Europe.
In England the rule of the Anglo-Saxons, colonizers of post Roman Britain since the fifth century, was at an end. A new era began in 1066 when the Normans, led by William the Conqueror, took over England, grafting a new cultural shoot to the old Roman/Anglo-Saxon/Celtic stock.
1286-1308: this was a period of unprecedented drought in America, contributing to the demise of the Pueblo Culture, a grim record of the disastrous effects of climate change.
1532-1553: At the start of this period the Inca Empire was toppled by the superior weapons and small pox infection brought by the Spanish conquerors.
At the height of a global renaissance in art, philosophy and science, between 1533 and 1534, Henry VIII didn’t just find a new way of getting rid of his pre-loved wives, but changed the course of history by founding a brand new Church of England, separated from Catholicism. His daughter by Anne Boleyn, the future Elizabeth I, champion of Protestantism, was born in 1536 during the transit of Pluto in Aquarius.
At the same time Calvin began preaching Protestantism in northern Europe, fighting against the established Church’s corruption and power-mongering.
In 1540 the new Society of Jesus, founded by Ignacio de Loyola in 1540, received official sanction from the Pope. From that point the Jesuit Order thrived, to become one of the most influential religious organizations ever, holding sway particularly in the area of education, religious doctrine and missionary work, inquisition, the armed right arm of the popes, for centuries to come.
On May 24 1543 Copernicus published his ground-breaking astronomical treatise demonstrating that the Sun is at the center of our Solar System. More about this below, in the section of Pluto in Aquarius’ discoveries.
1777-1798: in 1787 a new nation was born in North America with the drafting of the US Constitution. While in 1793 Europe French revolutionaries beheaded their king! New ideals of freedom, democracy, justice and equality (concepts we attribute to Aquarius) and a drive to rebel against injustice were sprouting everywhere. The industrial revolution was also accelerating unprecedented changes that eventually affected everyone on the planet.
Particularly relevant for Australia was the arrival of the first convict ship in Botany Bay in 1788, a relative minor event producing lasting and unforeseen outcomes.
All these events didn’t just affect the few years when they happened, but had repercussions through the centuries, with ripple-effects we still feel today.
A common thread
Do astrologers believe that history repeats itself? Is our planet going to witness twenty years of enduring revolutionary changes between now and 2044? Most likely. Of course, circumstances have changed; Pluto’s passage into Aquarius was accompanied then by many other astrological factors that are not around today. Furthermore the changes will take place, in leaps and bounds, during the next twenty years, certainly not overnight.
The main theme emerging from a survey of the Pluto in Aquarius’ periods is one of momentous endings and beginnings. The world was then like now on the threshold of profound ideological, political, religious transformations, accompanied by radical re-distribution of power, the full extent of which became clear only in hind sight, centuries later.
Inventions and discoveries of the Pluto in Aquarius periods
The above were also times of rapid scientific developments and discoveries, a surge of new ideas/ideals that shaped centuries of cultural evolution. Here are a few illustrations.
In the year 79 Hero, Egyptian scientist from Alexandria, demonstrated the practical use of the steam engine, to generate energy, the same power that ended up driving the industrial revolution 18 centuries later.
In 310 Diophantus, a Greek mathematician, published a treatise on a revolutionary method of calculation the Arabs called Algebra, where letters were used to express unknown quantities, thus making possible to solve complex equations by logic deduction, a very abstract, ground-breaking notion (Aquarian).
Between 1041 and 1048 a Chinese inventor, known as Bi Sheng (990-1051) perfected the ancient craft of movable type. His revolutionary system allowed printing books on a scale never possible before, another democratic ‘invention’ that eventually contributed to amazing developments all over the world.
In 1299 specialized industries in Europe began manufacturing eyeglasses on a grand scale. Where would we be today without our reading glasses?
On May 24, 1543 Copernicus published the ground-breaking astronomical treatise on ‘the Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres’, demonstrating that the Sun is at the center of our Solar System, a scientific upgrade of immense proportion. That single scholarly accomplishment sparked what we now call the Copernican Revolution, contributing greatly in placing an intelligent humanity, free from constraining religious dogmas, at the center of our conscious universe, birth of the modern Ego.
Copernicus made his discoveries public only on his death bed, to avoid excommunication and imprisonment for going against the established doctrine of the then all powerful Catholic Church.
In 1781 Hershel’s discovery of Uranus opened a new chapter in astronomical findings, greatly expanding our knowledge of the solar family of which we are a part, while also introducing a new revolutionary character in our astrological pantheon.
1796 the small pox vaccine, an endemic disease that had gripped the world from time immemorial, was discovered by accident.
At the present time the potentials of a new technological revolution are staggering, especially in the area of communication technology, robotics, medicine, physics, space travel, environmental and humanistic science.
One thing is certain, Pluto in Aquarius will not leave a stone unturned in its endeavor to transform our way of thinking, to embrace more original, ingenious, humanitarian, democratic ways to tackle our existential issues and those of the planet.
Twenty Years in a nutshell: Major Transits involving Pluto in Aquarius +
Saturn Pisces semi-square Pluto Aquarius, 3 passes 2024
February 21, 2026: Saturn conjunct Neptune on Aries 0°, one pass
March 29, 2026: Saturn in Aries sextile Pluto Aquarius, one pass
2026/2028: Uranus in Gemini trine Pluto in Aquarius, 5 passes
2026/2032: Neptune in Aries sextile Pluto Aquarius, 13 passes!
2028/2029: Saturn in Taurus square Pluto in Aquarius, 3 passes
2028/2030: Pluto Aquarius square Chiron Taurus, 5 passes.
2031: Saturn Gemini trine Pluto Aquarius, one pass.
2031/2034: Uranus in Gemini sesqui-square Pluto in Aquarius, 7 passes!
2032/2033: Saturn Gemini sesqui-square Pluto Aquarius, 3 passes
2035/2036: Saturn in Leo opposition Pluto Aquarius, 3 passes
2039/2040: Saturn in Libra sesqui-square Pluto Aquarius, 3 passes
2037/2038: Pluto in Aquarius trine Chiron in Gemini, 3 passes
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