aepat: ASHTAKAVARGA With Translation in English and Explanatory Notes By CHANDULAL SAKARALAL PATEL, B. A. and Cc. A, SUBRAMANIA ATYAR, B.Sc. Sole Distributors : Messrs. Gopal Narayen & Co, Princess Street, Kalbadevi, BOMBAY 2 Price Rs. 10; Sh. 203 $ 3. HERMIT‘Aut Ricuts Reseaven Rust Inprasion 1957 Printed by 8. B. Duawate at the Karnatak Printing Press, Chia Bazar, Bombay 2, and published by CHANDULAL SAKARALAL PATEL, B.A, Navnitnagar, Haveli Road, Ghatkopar, Bombay-39.FOREWORD "To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven :"—So says Solomon the ancient sage, and the truth of these words of wisdom cannot be better comprehended than through the science of astrology, for the aim of the science is to guide humanity by pointing out periods of prosperity and adversity in individual as well as national life and by defining the various stages in the evolution of man. By the beacon light of the stars the science helps us in locating the time and place of any event and depicting also the nature of the event. ‘Thus it plays an important part in the life of the human race, and naturally from times immemorial wise men of every country have been trying to discover various methods for calculating the time factor underlying every “ season” of human life and for foretell- ing the quality of the harvest of the season. It is well-nigh impossible to say exactly when and where astrology had its origin. But we may safely assume that the birth of the science was almost synchronous with the birth of the human race, for otherwise we cannot explain why we come across traces ‘of ancient people lisping in the language of the stars in almost ‘every nation that has some claim to high antiquity. As for India, it may be a moot point whether she rocked the cradle of astrology, but no one cam deny the fact that she has contributed a very large amount of knowledge to promote the growth of the science. This great heritage of the past, or at least a part of it, is being slowly re-discovered through the efforts of research scholars, and I am glad to say that one such welcome attempt to recover an ancient treasure from the hands of all-devouring Time has been success- fully made by my friends Shri C. S, Patel and Shri C. A. S. Aiyar in compiling and publishing this treatise om the Ashtakavarga system. The authors of the treatise have given us a full and lucid expla- nation of the principles and the modus operandi of the Ashtaka- varga in the light of the knowledge garnered from every possible source, with the result that what they are presenting us today is not merely the re-hash of some moth-eaten Sanskrit come but a critical compendium of all available information on the subject.