Walter Berg (ウォルター バーグ, b. 1947) is a British astrologer, known for his system of a 13-sign sidereal astrology (13星座), "a sidereal system that uses the actual star constellations of the true zodiac". He has published several best selling books on horoscopy and divination in Japan and has appeared regularly on Fuji Television.
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Berg was born Barry Parkinson in Chorley, Lancashire, England on October 28, 1947. Between 1988 and 1994 he wrote extensively for electronic repair manuals and produced course material for science education.
In 1980, while studying and practicing astrology Berg became acquainted with astrologer Jeff Mayo and collaborated with him on several projects while developing 13-sign astrology.
In 1989 he began writing "The Evening Sky", a monthly New Age and cultural astronomy feature syndicated to local newspapers, schools, colleges, universities, and released onto the Packet Switched Radio Network. A monthly guest on BBC Eastern Counties and Three Counties Radio, independent Horizon and Chiltern Radio was the ‘expert spokesperson’ on numerous national radio and television networks. He received a COPUS award from the Royal Society in 1993 for work Promoting the Public Understanding of Science.
Berg published The 13 Signs of the Zodiac in 1995, which sold well in the UK. The 13 Signs of the Zodiac was published in Japan in 1996 in a translation by radio host Mizui Kumi (水井久美), and the first edition sold out within days. Throughout 1996 Berg appeared each Monday on Fuji Television’s ‘Big Today’ programme networked nationally to an audience of nine million.[1] During 1996-97 Berg wrote for major Japanese magazines and produced a weekly column in the broadsheet newspaper Sankei that he continues to write. Berg has constructed 13-sign profiles for many ‘A’ list Japanese celebrities and politicians.[2]
The introduction of a 13 sign zodiac by Berg explains the appearance of Ophiuchus in Japanese pop culture, especially in the Final Fantasy series [3] (Ophiuchus is the final Stellazzio coin collected by Queen Stella.) In 1995 Berg proposed a symbol for Ophiuchus which has come into comparatively widespread use in Japan. The symbol looks like a letter U with a superimposed tilde. In 2009, it was suggested for inclusion in the Unicode standard as part of an emoji extension. The symbol has been added to the Unicode Miscellaneous Symbols codepage (U+26CE ⛎) as of version 6.0 (October 2010). [4] [5]
In 2008, he published (under Barry Parkinson, his birth name) a book combining traditional 12-sign horoscopy with the concept of blood group based personality types popularized in Japan in the 1970s by Masahiko Nomi, resulting in a system of 48 personality types.
He currently practices from Mayfair, London, UK and Shibuya-ku, Tokyo, Japan.[6]
Western tropical astrology has long been detached from the constellations eponymous of the signs, due to the axial precession of the equinoxes over the centuries since the introduction of the zodiac by the Chaldeans. By contrast, in sidereal astrology the astrological signs remain attached to the constellations, while the vernal equinox has moved away from Aries over time. Sidereal astrology has traditionally only been practiced in Indian Jyotisha, but it has been introduced in western astrology by Cyril Fagan in 1944. A small minority of western astrologers have since followed Fagan and used a sidereal system as in Indian tradition.
| Sign | Traditional (tropical) dates | Dates based on the ecliptic (as of 2011)[7] |
||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aries | (The Ram) | March 21 to April 20 | April 18 to May 13 | |
| Taurus | (The Bull) | April 21 to May 20 | May 13 to June 21 | |
| Gemini | (The Twins) | May 21 to June 21 | June 21 to July 20 | |
| Cancer | (The Crab) | June 22 to July 22 | July 20 to August 10 | |
| Leo | (The Lion) | July 23 to August 22 | August 10 to September 16 | |
| Virgo | (The Virgin) | August 23 to September 22 | September 16 to October 30 | |
| Libra | (The Scales) | September 23 to October 22 | October 30 to November 23 | |
| Scorpio | (The Scorpion) | October 23 to November 22 | November 23 to November 29 | |
| Ophiuchus | (The Serpent Bearer) | November 29 to December 18 | ||
| Sagittarius | (The Archer / Centaur) | November 23 to December 21 | December 18 to January 20 | |
| Capricorn | (The Sea-goat) | December 22 to January 20 | January 20 to February 16 | |
| Aquarius | (The Water Bearer) | January 21 to February 18 | February 16 to March 11 | |
| Pisces | (The Fish) | February 19 to March 20 | March 11 to April 18 | |
Berg in his 13-sign astrology combines sidereal astrology with the official constellation boundaries defined in 1930. This results in astrological signs that correspond directly to the time the Sun spends in their eponymous constellations. For example, the Sun spends forty-five days in Virgo while only six days in Scorpio. The 13th sign is Ophiuchus, where the Sun passes during the first two weeks of December.
Berg argues that the movement of stars, planets, comets and asteroids through space affects the solar magnetic field; this in turn affects the geomagnetic field influencing collective and individual electro/chemical/ biological systems. [8] Human bio-resonant systems are able to tune into particular astro-resonant cycles. When constructing charts he uses dimension z in addition to the x and y coordinates which form the geometric patterns. The z coordinate is allocated an energy value of varying strength.