Order of the Golden Fleece Armorial Plate, Lukas de Heere

March 20 - April 19, 2021

In the origin myth of Aries, a boy is saved from sacrifice by a golden-winged ram, who flies him on his back to safety in the faraway land of the Sun kings. There, the boy offers up the ram to the gods and hangs its fleece on an oak in the sacred grove of Ares, where it is guarded by a dragon and fire-breathing bulls. It hangs there as a symbol of heroism, of a chosen elite, of starting over, and of solar glory. To obtain the Golden Fleece, as Jason would find generations later, is to achieve sovereignty, and to assume the mantle of kingship. 

Aries and Scorpio are both under the rulership of Mars, the god of war and the planet of courage and will, but Aries is his diurnal home, as well as the sign of the Sun’s exaltation. Where a Scorpionic Mars would have us overcome the nocturnal, Plutonian fears of the psyche—to survive, and evolve, through our pain, and to understand the soul’s shadows—Arian Mars sends us on a hero’s journey into the outside world, with its own unknown challenges, dangers, and ultimate rewards. Whether you are a toddler learning to walk, a warrior going into battle, or a traveller heading off on your path—head first, and one foot in front of the other, says Aries, is the only way to do it.

For those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, Aries marks the beginning of spring and the promise of new life. Like the first green shoots poking up out of the ground, and the flowers with their hardy fragility; with the ground still cold and winter only barely in the rearview—Aries has the audacity to live. To claim their birthright, even against the odds. In the Southern Hemisphere, it is the opposite, as the autumnal equinox heralds the waning year, but the same could still be said: Aries is assured of its own survival, and eventual renewal, in a few months’ time, and will accept the darkness with courage. No matter which season gives them birth, those born under this sign are made from the rays of the invincible, all-conquering Sun. Forged in the furnace of Mars, they have the will to face both life and death. With such god-given firepower at its disposal, Aries has the rare ability to create new beginnings where and when necessary, and to boldly keep moving forward, no matter what.