Saturn's Agriculture: Dung Births Diamonds

In ancient Greece and Rome, Saturn was god of agriculture, the force to beseech for good harvests. His symbol was the sickle, and one of his epithets was Sterculius: “of manure”. Through Saturn, agriculture was symbol of excellency, wealth & abundance. Paradoxically, the same romans also believed that Saturn ruled suffering, sickness, depressions & lowly things. This union of agriculture and suffering recalls the curse in Genesis: 

“Cursed is the ground because of you; through toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it will yield for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your bread.” 

-Genesis 3:17 

In this curse, God gave humans agriculture as punishment - a way to show us that we had fallen out of favor with him and hence had to humbly sweat & toil to receive joy. Despite his associations with abundance Saturn is canonically linked to that which is humble, close to the ground, & sometimes shameful. For example, the grimoire Picatrix associates Saturn with “those who labor in the earth, farmers, builders of buildings, servants, thieves, melancholy & illness”. However, Saturn’s power is that he is the lord of reversals: he teaches us that that which appears to be low, humble & ordinary often holds power over that which appears to be lofty, and that no high structure can stand tall without the support of the ground. It’s for this reason that, as mentioned earlier, Saturn paradoxically rules both abundance and lowliness. Even the grandest, highest tree only stands tall by the support of its soils.  

“So, the last shall be first, and the first last: for many be called, but few chosen.” 

 - Matthew 20:16 

“Mercury and Venus are friends of Saturn (...) while the Sun & Moon are his enemies.” 

-BPHS, 3.54–56 

The astrological enmity between the Sun & Moon (kings, queens, exaltation, high status) and Saturn exists because of this -- although the king’s social status trumps his servants, their culminated horsepower renders him vulnerable & their insurrection would propel him into existential crisis. As a baby is dependent on his mother's provision, a king is dependent on the commoner's provision of fertile soils for his reign to bloom... lest he be plagued by infertile soils capable only of bearing weeds of mutiny. 

Take this example: a spoilt King’s position renders him incompetent with mundane but essential tasks that require him to be grounded, e.g., gathering and cooking his own food. This lack of familiarity with the mundane places him in dependency upon his Saturn-esque, lowly servant who has the social freedom to carry out low class, shameful activities like plowing the earth for food. Saturn represents a power whose lowliness and proximity to the nadir lets it spread out far & vast across any given space. In the same way, we observe that whilst the masses don’t find themselves elevated vertically in high and lofty towers, they embody something more powerful: unified, horizontal protraction across low but endlessly lengthening, vast spaces. This makes them boundless, well-fortified and undefeatable. It is for this reason that despite its association with shameful, low things like dung, manure, soils, servants, depressions and nadirs, suffering, misery and denials, Saturn has been long considered to be the most powerful of the celestial orbs, closest to God and perfection. Guarded behind its humility and discomfort lie the only heaven that is truly unending and indestructible. As the soil from which all matter grows, nothing on earth can thrive without Saturn’s permission and blessing. 

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Now to give more context on Saturn’s ‘positive’ associations – as mentioned earlier, in Ancient Rome Saturn was

the planet & God most associated with wealth. In his ‘golden era’ of rulership, abundance was prolific. In Ancient Rome, the Temple of Saturn housed the Roman Treasury, containing all the Republic’s gold and silver reserves: hence the centralised wealth of the mighty Rome entirely lay under Saturn’s ‘control’. In this way we can see that Saturn was associated with material wealth in its highest, most generational echelons, the pinnacles of success. From this perspective, the soil previously disregarded as lowly is now a treasury, the crypt where wealth is hidden and stored... and agriculture is our means of drawing it forth. Of course, plowing the earth for fruits is an arduous job- it’s for this reason that the average man is denied wealth, he lacks the determination and consistency to toil for it. Aside from determination, many lack the foresight and intelligence to realise that there is treasure buried underneath unassuming sands. Saturn appreciates dedication so would never give those searching for wealth a map in which ‘X marks the spot’. Uncomfortable with delayed gratification, they search for more immediate boons and are duped by the soil's mundanity: hence the average man lacks the intuitive understanding of soil/ Saturn needed to farm the rarest fruits/wealth. This element reveals the clandestine, concealing nature of Saturn: known to ancient Babylonians as “the blackened midnight sun”, he cloaks his hot white wealth in opaque darkness to prevent the unworthy from stumbling across diamonds undeservingly. Saturn rewards only consistency, dedication, toil and discipline. Only he who is humble enough to plow the soils that appear meagre will know the bliss of cultivating Eden, a garden where wealth knows no end and fruits know no spoil. 

The First Fruits of the Earth Offered to Saturn - Giorgio Vasari, 1555-56