ABSTRACT

Astrology as a method of predicting events was as ubiquitous in esoteric circles at the fin de siecle as it had been in the Middle Ages; with few exceptions, German-speaking astrologers writing at the time Jung began work on Liber Novus pursued astrology as a method of foretelling the future. There was no specific German astrological 'movement' until the mid-1920s, and the psychologically orientated astrology that subsequently began to develop in the German-speaking world relied heavily on Jung's own publications. The astrological elements were clearly important in Jung’s assessment of his patients’ horoscopes, as his comments about Miss X indicate. While he continued to formulate his astrological experience through terms such as ‘synchronicity’, which he hoped would be acceptable to a scientific community, he also deepened his understanding of astrology’s relationship with other liminal spheres, particularly alchemy, whose symbolism likewise provided him with a model of the individuation process.