Q Quintile
Mercury quintile North Node
Understanding comes easily in that direction. Associated with picking things up quickly where it matters most.
- Angle
- 72°
- Orb used
- ±2°
- Type
- Soft
- Bodies
- ☿ ☊
What these two are about together
Thinking and the direction of development. Associated with learning as the route forward, and with the difference between what a person already knows and what they will have to.
What a quintile does
The quintile divides the zodiac by five rather than by two, three, four or six, which puts it outside the classical scheme entirely. Kepler introduced it, and the tradition since has associated it with a particular kind of ability: a talent that is developed rather than given, and that tends to be applied to making something. It is the aspect most often described as the signature of craft.
How it reads
Understanding comes easily in that direction. Associated with picking things up quickly where it matters most.
In practice
Read as aptitude rather than ease. A trine describes something that costs nothing. A quintile describes something a person has repeatedly chosen to work at, often without being able to say why.
What to watch for
Claiming too much for it. The quintile has the thinnest traditional record of anything in this table, and honest practice treats it as suggestive rather than established.
The two planets
Mercury: Mind, language and how you process
North Node: The direction of growth, and the thing you have no practice at
Mercury and North Node at other angles
- Mercury conjunction North NodeTwo bodies at the same degree, acting as one
- Mercury semi-sextile North NodeThirty degrees apart: neighbouring signs, with little in common
- Mercury semi-square North NodeForty-five degrees apart: half a square, and read as half its weight
- Mercury sextile North NodeSixty degrees apart: cooperation that has to be taken up
- Mercury square North NodeNinety degrees apart: two things that will not sit still together
- Mercury trine North NodeA hundred and twenty degrees apart: the same element, working together
- Mercury sesquiquadrate North NodeA hundred and thirty-five degrees: a square and a half
- Mercury quincunx North NodeA hundred and fifty degrees apart: two things that cannot be compared
- Mercury opposition North NodeDirectly across the chart: two ends of one axis
Find this in your own chart
A reading like this only tells you what the pairing is associated with. Whether Mercury and North Node actually make this angle in your chart depends on your birth date, time and place.