Perseus, Saint George, Ogun, Zumbi
Today, the Moon is in Scorpio while Mars is transiting Algol, so I'm bringing some personal and cultural observations about Perseus. For some reason, I've been having a lot of little magical moments with this constellation. It seems that whenever something is transiting it, a lot of coincidences happen and I notice more about it.
I've been noticing its particular relationship with important aspects of brazilian history and culture, which makes sense as even the chart of the european invasion had Saturn with Algol (although I'm not going to talk about that specifically).
Saint George Parish Church in Rio de Janeiro during Saint George's day in 2026.
So, one september morning, as I was having breakfast, still unaware that the Moon was passing through Algol that day, I was listening to the song Lua de São Jorge (Moon of Saint George). And when I think of Saint George, I think of Perseus. Astrologically and mythologically, Saint George is famously associated with Perseus, having inherited a lot of the elements and narrative patterns from his legend. Saint George is said to have been executed as the Sun passed through Algol on April 23rd in the year 303, strenghtening the link with the greek hero. Check out my other posts about Perseus and Algol here.
But first let me tell you of the bigger context, because, first of all, I live in the state of Rio de Janeiro, where Saint George is the patron saint, and we celebrate and honor him on April 23rd. Saint George has a lot of devotees throughout the country and the festivals can last days, especially in Rio, where April 23rd became a public holiday. But even beyond that, Brazil has a lot of religious syncretism, particularly between catholicism, religions of african origin and indigenous practices. The history of syncretism in Brazil isn't a pretty one, but it's become part of the culture and on the same holiday, religions of african origin celebrate and honor the orisha Ogun, therefore it can't be considered just a Catholic holiday. Ogun is the orisha of iron, war, metalworking, hunting, agriculture, technology and innovation. Ogun and Saint George share important similar qualities with Perseus. The three figures are understood as warriors or heroes who defend people from the oppression of those in power, who are incredibly corageous, who fight monsters, and their symbols are powerful to ward off evil.
Anyway, as I was listening to the song, I started googling Saint George, and that’s when I found out that in 2023, the National Confederation of Commerce filed a lawsuit with the Supreme Court against the holiday, claiming it was unconstitutional, because, according to them, creating holidays isn’t a state's competence and that it violated the right to work and to commerce. Basically, big businesses just didn't want to give their workers a day off in the middle of April anymore. Beyond that, the festivities are marked very strongly by elements of afro-brazilian culture, even in the catholic churches, and we can definitely say there's a combination of religious prejudice and racial discrimination in the motivations.
They obviously lost the case and now the holiday has the validation of the Supreme Court. But the case's rapporteur and the only one in favor was the Supreme Court's vice-president, Nunes Marques, who was born with the Sun on Algol and was now trying to kill everyone's vibe. What's important to notice is how both sides of a dispute can be influenced by the same energy, because it's an alegory and the story doesn't need order.
Saint George's day is a public holiday for the preservation of intangible historical and cultural heritage and that's perfectly under any states' jurisdiction. The size and significance of the festival for the culture are huge not only for one religious group. Catholics, umbandistas, camdomblecistas and even non-religious people in Rio celebrate Saint George's holiday going to mass, rodas de samba and eating feijoada at lunch — which is the traditional way to celebrate Ogun, but now many Catholic churches also serve feijoada after morning mass. We have so many songs about Saint George and Ogun by all of our biggest artists — a lot of them sambas and always referencing both at the same time. It's really like a Christmas, you don't have to be religious to enjoy it: here's a compilation album.
A woman holds a leaf of "Saint George’s sword" during Mass, though the plant is african and originally linked to Ogun.
Feijoada and roda de samba during a Saint George's day in Rio.
I've been noticing how a lot of the symbolism surrounding Saint George and Ogun are dominant in Brazilian culture and I love the consistency in which they get linked to the constellation of Perseus. Saint George and Ogun are seen more as warriors and they have a strong martial quality to them, even though here I'm relating them to Perseus, a constellation that's said to have effects like Jupiter and Saturn. Either way, all three are heroes/entities associated with strength and protection above all.
It's widely common for brazilian people to have the "Saint George's sword" plant right outside their door to protect from evil, which is also used in banishing rituals and as a symbol to honor Ogun. Also known in other countries as "snake plant", it's from the genus dracaena, which comes from the greek drakaina, "female dragon", coincidentally the mythic creature that Saint George slayed.
Brazilian history and identity carry a lot of martian symbolism and events — with an impressive number of military coup d'etáts, a record time of chattel slavery, endless exploration, many revolts and working class stuggles etc. Even in its name, Brazil is martial. Because despite our green and yellow flag, "brasil" is a word for red in portuguese, specifically the red of glowing embers. It's the word that's in the name of a native tree that, when you peel off its bark, it looks like it’s bleeding or catching fire, thus the portuguese colonizers would call it paubrasil - brazilwood, meaning "red-as-embers-wood". The Tupi call it arabutã. Saint George and Ogun are both strongly associated with the color red.
We actually have another holiday to remember a national hero who gets related to Ogun. It's Zumbi dos Palmares, who's remembered to have died in November 20th, 1695. On that day, we had a full Moon on the degree of the fixed star Mirfak (alpha Persei) as Zumbi was assassinated for being the leader of a legendary quilombo, a highly organized community of runaway enslaved black and indigenous people that became almost impenetrable.
Well, Zumbi wasn't his real name. That was what people called him because of his reputation for being supposedly immortal, because he became a legend while still alive and is now revered almost as an entity or saint. To put it very simply, Quilombo dos Palmares turned into a threat to the colonizer's slaveholding system, because as they repeately failed to dismantle the quilombo and kill their leader, Zumbi's reputation grew and inspired more revolts. When the famous "Zombie of Palmares" was executed, his head was displayed in a public square in Recife to dissipate the legend of his immortality. Today, a monument stands in his honor at the same spot.
Artist: Abelardo da Hora. There are many other monuments dedicated to Zumbi all over the country.
The word comes from the kimbundu's concept of Zombe, which is not like what we understand in hollywoodian popular culture as a zombie. Zombe is a word for "corpse", "dead" or something like a duende. It can have slightly different meanings and practices associated with it in different traditions of the bantu diaspora. "Zumbi" or "cazumbi" can refer to a wandering spirit that goes out at night haunting people, but the origin of the word mostly refers to the general belief in the ancestral spirits and spirit incorporation. The cerimonies and rituals in brazilian religions that have an african origin/influence involve spirit incorporation as a central practice. In haitian folklore, things become even more complex in the tradition of vodou, where supposedly a corpse can be reanimated by a "bokor" (a vodou priest or priestess) in a magical ritual. It's important to emphasize that these traditions have conceptualizations of spirits that are very different from the distortion we get in popular culture, but it's just not my goal to get into depth about that.
As I've said before, Perseus is a spring time constellation, and this specific part of the sky in babylonian astrology had to do with some kind of opening of the earth and potential for the dead to get out of the underworld at this time of year. The image of an old man holding a decapitated head could have been representing a kind of banishing ritual, with him driving the spirits back to the underworld in a similar manner to how Perseus uses the head of Medusa as protection. I wonder if the old man could be representing some kind of wise elder like a priest, given the spiritual nature of the constellation. The use of a scary head as protection reminds me of carrancas, which are sculptures of figureheads, still commonly used here to be put outside homes for protection from evil eye or evil spirits.
Zumbi (1927) by Antônio Parreiras.
Zumbi dos Palmares is like our Perseus. And death can show as much about life as the birth. The exalted full Moon just garantees his impact and immortality. It formed an exact square to Mars in Leo, after separating from a trine with Jupiter in Virgo — nicely symbolizing a story about a community blessed with abundance, intelligence and skill coming to war with the colonial forces. Because this isn't merely about one man becoming a hero, especially when we're talking about a full Moon. Quilombo dos Palmares was the largest quilombo, and Zumbi wasn't the sole responsible for its success while it lasted. The community is also in this story told by this chart. Every november we remmember not only Zumbi's death, but also Quilombo dos Palmares' power, and we remmember the strength of the collective and people's power to revolt.
Slavery was abolished (on paper) in 1888, on May 13th, a day of Sun conjunct Algol, which became another national holiday, but we don't really celebrate that day, especially not as much as we celebrate Zumbi.
To finish, I should say we also have songs dedicated to Zumbi, so here's a favorite from an artist who's a big Saint George/Ogun devotee:
