Twelve Signs, One Sky

In astrology, each of the twelve zodiac signs is associated with a date range, an element (fire, earth, air, or water), a modality (cardinal, fixed, or mutable), and a ruling planet. Together these form a kind of shorthand - a set of symbolic traits that practitioners use to describe personality, motivation, and outlook. None of this is scientifically verified; think of it as a shared cultural language for talking about temperament, the same way people speak of "a summer person" or "an old soul."