♒ (Aquarius) is the 11th astrological sign in the Western zodiac, ruled by the planet Uranus. Its ancient ruler was Saturn. The Sun is in this sign between 20 January and 18 February.
Juan Eduardo Cirlot wrote in his Dictionary of Symbols:
Its allegorical representation is a figure of a man pouring water from an amphora. In the Egyptian Zodiac of Denderah, Aquarius carries two amphorae. This version merely affects the numerical symbolism; it affords clearer proof of the dual force of the symbol (its active and passive aspects, evolution and involution), a duality which is of the essence in the important symbol of the Gemini. All Eastern and Western traditions relate this archetype to the symbolic flood which stands not only for the end of a formal universe but also for the completion of any cycle by the destruction of the power which held its components together. When this power ceases to function, the components return to the Akasha — the universal solvent — which is symbolized by Pisces. In these two signs of the Zodiac, then, the cosmic pralaya, or Brahma’s night, runs its course. Its function, according to Hindu tradition, is to reabsorb into Oneness all those elements which originally seceded from it to lead separate individual existences. Thus, each end carries the seed of a new beginning (Ouroboros). The Egyptians identified Aquarius with their god Hapi, the personification of the Nile, whose floods were the source of the agricultural, economic and spiritual life of the country. Consequently, Aquarius symbolizes the dissolution and decomposition of the forms existing within any process, cycle or period; the loosening of bonds; the imminence of liberation through the destruction of the world of phenomena.
Man, that’s deep... and rather scary. And if you’ve read that far, you might as well wonder if “liberation through the destruction” is related at all to “the mind’s true liberation” as sung in Aquarius from Hair.
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