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Natal Chart

A Natal chart shows a person's birth chart: the sky at the birth moment for the birthplace, cast from a natal record. Use it to read a birth chart, and to try small changes to the birth time and see their effect. Click Charts → Natal Chart to open one (see New Chart), then select a natal record in the settings panel; use the chevrons above the wheel to step the birth moment.

What Defines a Natal Chart​

The natal record supplies both the moment and the place, so the chart has no Location row and no date and time pickers on the time band, and the record's date and time show in the Natal Date and Natal Time rows of the settings panel. You set the chart up here:

  • You choose the natal record in the settings panel, from the records in the Natal Records database. Its date and time are filled in from the record and can be varied there without changing the stored record.
  • You also choose the frame, the bodies and the aspect angles in the settings panel.
  • The chevrons on the time band step the birth moment itself.

Aspects are matched among the natal bodies, and parallels can be drawn. A new Natal chart opens at the default natal record's birth moment.

How It Differs from the Mundane and Transit Charts​

Window Layout​

The Natal chart window holds these areas:

  • Chart Window Toolbar: four icon buttons at the top left of the window, above the settings panel, for saving the chart and opening the Chart Settings and Aspect Settings editors.
  • Natal Chart Configuration: the settings panel, opening with the Natal Record, Natal Date and Natal Time rows, then the frame rows, the Paral. Aspects drop-down, the Bodies list and the Aspects grid. The frame rows are described in Chart Frame, the list in Chart Bodies Selection and the grid in Chart Aspect Angles.
  • Chart Time Navigation: the time band above the wheel, with a step-unit drop-down and back and forward chevrons that step the birth moment. On a Natal chart the band carries no date and time pickers.
  • Chart Message Banner: a banner above the wheel that appears only when there is an error or a notice to report about the chart's calculation.
  • Chart Wheel: the wheel in the middle of the window, with a splitter between it and the settings panel that moves width between them. Right-clicking a body glyph or an aspect chord opens the Wheel Context Menu.
  • Chart Display Options: the display strip beneath the wheel, with Coord. Format, Display Lat./Decl. and Display Chart Info.

The Natal chart window, labeled to show its toolbar, settings panel, birth-moment step controls, wheel and display options.