KP astrology: how the 249 sub-lords are computed

KP is arithmetic before it is interpretation. If the sub-lords are placed wrongly by a few minutes of arc, every judgement built on them is wrong. Here is how the numbers come out, and what Bodhlok does with them.

Twenty-seven stars, nine sub-divisions, 249 subs

Each of the 27 nakshatras spans 13°20′. Krishnamurti divided every nakshatra into nine unequal subs, one per dasha lord, in Vimshottari proportion: Ketu's sub is 7/120 of the star, Venus's 20/120, the Sun's 6/120, and so on, in the Vimshottari order starting from the star's own lord. Twenty-seven times nine is 243. The published table has 249 because six subs straddle a sign boundary and are counted on both sides: a sub that begins in Aries and ends in Taurus is two entries, since the sign lord, the signifier the system reads first, changes in the middle of it.

Bodhlok computes the table rather than storing it: for any longitude it returns the sign lord, the star lord and the sub lord, and for horary work it maps a number from 1 to 249 back to the start of that sub as the ascendant.

Why the cusps must be Placidus

KP judges a matter by the sub-lord of its house cusp, and it is explicit that those cusps are Placidus, not equal-house or whole-sign. The Placidus cusps of the intermediate houses (2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, 12) are not simple fractions of the ecliptic; they are found by solving for the point on the ecliptic that divides the semi-arc in time, which depends on the latitude and the sidereal time (the ARMC). Bodhlok solves that from the ARMC for each chart, so a native born at 28°N and one born at 8°N get different intermediate cusps even with the same ascendant. Near the polar circles Placidus breaks down; the desk says so rather than printing a number.

What the desk shows

• Cuspal table: each house cusp with its sign lord, star lord and sub lord, and the planets deposited in each house.
• Significators: for every house, the planets that signify it by the four KP rules, in order of strength (occupant of the star of an occupant, occupant, occupant of the star of the lord, the lord).
• Ruling planets for the moment the question is judged: the lords of the day, the Moon's sign and star, and the ascendant's sign and star at that instant.
• Horary by number: the querent picks 1–249; the desk builds the chart with that sub's start as the ascendant and the actual time for everything else.

Reading a sub-lord

The classic question is marriage: the sub-lord of the 7th cusp, judged through the houses its star lord signifies. If that sub-lord signifies 2, 7 or 11, marriage is promised; if it is in the star of a planet signifying 1, 6 or 10, it is denied or delayed. The desk lists the houses each sub-lord signifies so the judgement is a glance rather than a lookup, and the consult can be asked the question in words.