Origin 600 to 800 CE
The Shashtiamsha (D-60), also called Shashtyamsha, divides each sign into sixty parts of just half a degree each, the finest and most subtle of the sixteen vargas. It is the divisional chart of accumulated past-life karma and the totality of all matters, and it was held in the highest regard by Parashara, who gave it great weight in judgment. Because each amsha is so small, precise birth time is essential, and each of the sixty portions carries its own name and auspicious or inauspicious character. It is consulted as a summarizing chart that reflects the deep karmic background behind every area of life.
Facts
Origins
Origin Period600 to 800 CE 1Tradition: Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra One of the shodashavarga, the sixteen divisional charts set out in the extant Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra. Nine of the sixteen appear only in this later layer; the graded schemes of six, seven, ten and sixteen divisions are the text's own, and the sixteen-fold set is not attested in the earlier literature. Origin PeriodThis finer divisional chart is set out in the Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra, which Pingree's survey situates within the sixth to eighth century CE stratum of classical Sanskrit horoscopy, later than the handful of vargas Varahamihira's earlier Brihat Jataka already names. 1Tradition: Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra Origin of the NameThe name is the Sanskrit ordinal of its divisor: shashtiamsha, the sixtieth part. 1 Attributed Author / CompilerParashara, to whom the Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra ascribes itself. The ascription is pseudepigraphic: Parashara is a sage of the epic and puranic literature, the extant text is a compilation of roughly the seventh to eighth century with later interpolation, and its surviving manuscripts are of the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries. The system is "Parashari" by convention, not by authorship. 1 Identity
Also Known As Attributions
GovernsPast-life karma, overall totality 1 Learn More
D-60 Shashtiamsha, the Chart of Past-Life Karma
The Shashtiamsha chart, D-60, is the sixteenth and finest of the divisional charts, formed by dividing each sign into sixty parts of just half a degree each. It signifies past-life karma and the overall totality of the nativity, the deepest layer of a chart's meaning. Because its divisions are so narrow, an accurate D-60 demands a precisely known birth time, and the classical authority Parashara gives it very high importance in judging the whole. Each of its sixty parts carries a named quality, benefic or malefic. An astrologer consults the D-60 for the karmic substratum of the life. These are the interpretive conventions of the tradition; the chart is the most sensitive of the harmonic subdivisions drawn from the birth longitudes, and the one most affected by any error in the recorded time.
The rule again follows odd and even parity: in the odd signs the sixty half-degree divisions are counted forward from the sign itself, cycling five full times through all twelve signs before completing the thirty degrees, while in the even signs the count instead begins from the seventh sign from the one being divided. Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra supplies a full list of sixty named qualities, some benefic and some distinctly harsh, Ghora and Rakshasa among the more severe names recorded, attached to the sixty positions in fixed order, and disagreement over how exactly this list of sixty names is meant to be paired with the odd and even counting sequence is a genuinely live, unresolved point of technical debate among contemporary Jyotisha practitioners and software authors alike.
D-60 in Practice: Half a Degree, and the Limit of the Method
One division of the Shashtiamsha spans 30 minutes of arc, half a degree, sixty to a sign and 720 in the zodiac. It is the finest division in the shodashavarga and it marks the practical limit of the whole technique.
The ascendant crosses half a degree in about two minutes. A birth time in error by five minutes therefore places the D-60 ascendant two or three divisions away from the truth, which is not a small distortion in a chart where each division carries its own name and character. Any D-60 reading that leans on its ascendant should state the recorded precision of the birth time alongside it.
The Moon crosses half a degree in roughly fifty five minutes, so even the Moon needs the hour to be right. The Sun takes about twelve hours and the slower bodies far longer, so their shashtiamshas are the stable part of the chart.
The counting rule itself is settled: the sixty divisions are counted from the sign being divided, and each carries a traditional name and nature rather than being read simply as a sign.
The Shashtiamsha enters at the dashavarga and continues in the shodashavarga, where the tradition gives it unusual weight for so fine a division. Its subject is the totality of past karma, which is offered as the reason a chart of this scale is thought to carry anything at all.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Originates in Language
The term is Sanskrit, and the technical vocabulary of the Panchanga and of jyotisha more widely is Sanskrit throughout, whatever the vernacular in which a given almanac is printed. The name is a Sanskrit term. Regional almanacs render it in the local script and pronunciation, so a reader will meet the same term in several transliterations without any difference of reference.
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