In Mandarin Chinese, 黄 (Pinyin: huáng 🔊) is an adjective meaning “yellow”. You must have heard this word as a part of 黄河 (黃河, Huáng Hé 🔊), the Yellow River. 黄 also can mean “pornographic”.
黄 is a simplified form of 黃. According to Wiktionary, 黃 is a phono-semantic compound of phonetic 炗 (guāng) and semantic 田 “field”, yellow (supposedly) being the colour of earth.
More photos related to colour yellow and chanterelle mushrooms @ Shutterstock.
♑ (Capricorn) is the tenth astrological sign in the Western zodiac, ruled by the planet Saturn. Just like the Taurus and Virgo, it is an earth sign. The Sun is in this sign between 21 December and 20 January.
Juan Eduardo Cirlot wrote in his Dictionary of Symbols:
Its dual nature, expressed allegorically in the form of a goat whose body terminates in a fish’s tail, refers to the dual tendencies of life towards the abyss (or water) on the one hand, and the heights (or mountains) on the other; these two currents also signify, in Hindu doctrine, the involutive and evolutive possibilities: the return to or the departure from the ‘wheel of rebirth’ (that is, the Zodiac).
♏ (Scorpio) is the eighth astrological sign in the Western zodiac. Just like the Cancer and Pisces, it is a water sign. Traditionally ruled by (the real planet) Mars, its modern ruler is (the dwarf planet) Pluto. The Sun is in this sign between 23 October and 22 November.
The symbol ♏ looks very much like that of Virgo, ♍, but its origin is much more obscure. The only thing we can be reasonably sure of is that the arrow attached to the “letter m” is related to a scorpion’s stinger. Juan Eduardo Cirlot wrote in his Dictionary of Symbols:
It corresponds to that period of the span of man’s life which lies under the threat of death (that is, the ‘fall’). It is also related with the sexual function. <...> In the symbolism of megaliths it is the antithesis of the bee whose honey succours Man. Finally, its symbolism is equivalent to that of the hangman.
♍ (Virgo) is the sixth astrological sign in the Western zodiac. The Sun is in this sign between 22 August and 22 September.
According to Wikipedia, the symbol ♍ is derived
from the Greek letters ΠΑΡ, which are the first three letters of the Greek word parthenos, which means “virgin”.
Juan Eduardo Cirlot wrote in his Dictionary of Symbols:
For the Egyptians it was identical with Isis. Since it is governed by Mercury and corresponds to the number six, it is symbolic of hermaphroditism, or that state which is characterized by dual — positive and negative — forces. Hence Virgo is sometimes depicted with the symbol of the soul or the Seal of Solomon (two triangles, representing fire and water, superimposed and intersecting to form a six-pointed star). In mythology and in religions generally, this symbol is always associated with the birth of a god or a demigod, as the supreme expression of the dynamic consciousness.
♓ (Pisces) is the twelfth astrological sign in the Western zodiac, ruled by the planet Neptune. The Sun is in this sign between 19 February and 20 March.
Juan Eduardo Cirlot wrote in his Dictionary of Symbols:
The last sign of the Zodiac, closely bound up with the symbolism of water and of the ‘dissolution of forms’ which takes place in the Akasha. Neptune whipping up the waves with his trident, and calling forth bulls and horses out of them, is a symbolic expression of the resurgence of cosmic energy from the watery deeps of the primordial ocean. If Capricorn marks the beginning of the process of dissolution, Pisces denotes the final moment which, for this very reason, contains within itself the beginning of the new cycle. Related to Pisces are the avatar in the form of the fish of Vishnu in India, and the Chaldean myth of Oannes the man-fish. This twelfth house of the Zodiac, when transposed, by analogy, to the existential and psychic plane, denotes defeat and failure, exile or seclusion, and also mysticism and the denial of the self and its passions. The dual aspect of this symbol is well expressed by the zodiacal sign itself, composed of two fishes arranged parallel to one another but facing in different directions: the left-hand fish indicates the direction of involution or the beginning of a new cycle in the world of manifestation, while the fish that faces the right points to the direction of evolution — the way out of the cycle.
Incidentally, Pisces was the first Latin zodiac name that I learned 40 years ago, thanks to the song by Livin’ Blues.
♈ (Aries) is the first astrological sign in the Western zodiac, ruled by the planet Mars. Just like the Leo and Sagittarius, it is a fire sign. The Sun is in this sign between 20 March and 19 April.
The symbol ♈ represents a ram’s horns. Juan Eduardo Cirlot wrote in his Dictionary of Symbols:
In Hindu symbolism it stands for Parabrahman, that is, for the undifferentiated whole. Because the Zodiac is the symbol of the cycle of existence, Aries, its first sign, stands for the original cause or the thunderbolt which emerges from the Akasha of Pisces, that is, from the ‘primordial waters’. Aries, because it stands for the initial impulse through which the potential becomes actual, is also related to the dawn and to Spring, and generally to the beginning of any cycle, process or creation. In Egypt the ram was the symbol of Amon-Ra, and the god was depicted with ram’s horns. As regards human physiology, Aries controls the head and the brain, that is to say, the organs which are the centre of the individual’s physical and spiritual energies, as Parabrahman is the centre of the cosmic forces.
