Double stars at the facing

Meaning

“Double stars at the facing” is one of the Flying Stars’ formations that Ulune names, a pattern that runs through the whole of a home’s chart: the period’s own number stands both as the mountain star and as the water star in the facing palace, at the front of the home.

雙星到向, shuāng xīng dào xiàng, the double stars come to the facing. The front counts twice: the water star is glad of what a front already offers, a view, a door, movement, while the mountain star, which wants something steady, looks for it close by.

Of the 216 main charts, the twenty-four facings of each of the nine periods, 60 carry this formation, in Periods 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8 and 9.

In practice

• What practitioners suggest: keeping the front open and lively for the water star, with one steady presence nearby for the mountain star, a wall, a tall plant, a heavy piece of furniture, rather than closing the view.
• In the Home lens: the chart’s reading names its formations. Built in Period 9, a home facing Zi, Gui, Gen, Yin, Mao, Yi, Chen, Bing, Wei, Geng, Qian or Hai carries this one; built in Period 8, a home facing Ren, Jia, Wu, Ding, You or Xin.
• Near an edge: the replacement chart, which Ulune shows beside the main one for a facing close to the edge of its mountain, has formations of its own, named the same way; it may keep this one or not.

Across traditions

• In the landscape the Form School wants the front open, for water; the double stars ask for both there, which is why practitioners add a single steady presence rather than a screen.
• The Eight Mansions read the same front for a person: beside the chart, the Home lens says whether the facing is one of the reader’s supportive directions, a second, separate reading of the same side.

Origin and history

With double stars at the sitting it makes the pair of charts that fill Periods 1 and 9: in those two periods every main chart brings the period’s stars together, at the front or at the back, and neither the prosperous nor the reversed chart appears among them. The present Period 9 gives the double stars at the facing to twelve of the twenty-four facings.

How Ulune calculates it

Ulune casts each home’s chart, then checks it against every formation it knows. For this one the rule is: the period’s own number stands both as the mountain star and as the water star in the facing palace, at the front of the home. It is read on the main chart and on the replacement chart alike, each on its own. Ulune’s tests check its formations against charts worked by hand.

An example: a home facing Zi, built in Period 9. The period chart sets 9 in the centre; the mountain star goes to the centre as a 4 and flies forward, the water star as a 5 and flies backward. At the back, in the palace of the south, stand mountain star 8 and water star 1; at the front, in the palace of the north, mountain star 9 and water star 9.

Correspondences