In a birth chart, Mars is linked with desire, action, courage and anger. It describes how you go after something you want and how you react when something gets in your way.
If Venus describes what you love, Mars describes how you pursue it. What gets you out of bed in the morning, whether you raise your voice in an argument, whether you make the first move or wait: in tradition, all of this is Mars territory.
How does Mars move across the sky?
Mars takes about 687 days to go around the Sun, a little under two years. It spends six or seven weeks in a sign on average. About every 26 months it goes into a retrograde period lasting two to two and a half months. Retrograde means that, seen from Earth, the planet appears to move backwards. During those stretches Mars can stay in a single sign for six or seven months.
So your Mars sign is shared by many people born within the same few weeks or months. In a personal reading, Mars's house and aspects count for as much as its sign.
What does Mars traditionally represent?
Classical astrology called Mars the "lesser malefic," with Saturn as the "greater malefic." Mars was associated with heat, cutting, separating, war and competition. It rules Aries, and in the traditional system Scorpio too. Modern astrology gives Scorpio to Pluto and keeps Mars paired with Aries.
Modern readings have mostly dropped the language of "malefic." Today Mars is read more as energy, determination, standing up for yourself, competition and sexuality. The drive to start something and the strength to hold your boundaries both belong to Mars.
What does your Mars sign describe?
Mars's sign is read as the tone of the way you take action. Splitting the signs into their three modes shows the broad pattern:
- Cardinal signs (Aries, Cancer, Libra, Capricorn): Mars wants to start things and make the first move.
- Fixed signs (Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, Aquarius): Mars keeps going, doesn't give up easily and digs in.
- Mutable signs (Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, Pisces): Mars adapts, changes direction and juggles several things.
Within each group the differences are big. Mars in Aries is read as fast and direct, Mars in Cancer as more indirect while protecting the people it loves, Mars in Capricorn as patient and focused on the goal.
Mars and anger
Because Mars is tied to anger, people often jump to "my Mars is strong, so I must be aggressive." Tradition links Mars less with anger itself than with the way anger comes out. Mars in Leo may show it openly; Mars in Libra may swallow it to keep the peace. Both are ways of expressing it.
In tradition, the signs where Mars struggles are Libra, Taurus and Cancer. That doesn't mean people with Mars there are weak. In those signs Mars is read as finding routes other than a head-on charge.
Mars's house and aspects
The house Mars sits in is read as where you spend most of your energy. Mars in the 1st is linked with a bold manner, in the 6th with throwing yourself into daily work, in the 10th with ambition and competition in your career.
The aspects describe how Mars works with other themes. An aspect between Mars and Venus is linked with attraction and desire, one between Mars and Jupiter with courage joined to optimism, and one between Mars and Saturn with energy meeting discipline, or a brake. Someone with Mars square Saturn can also be read as someone who learns to work steadily over the long haul rather than start in a rush.
Don't read Mars as something to fear
Classical sources also linked Mars with accidents, injuries and surgery, and some sites still describe these readings in alarming terms. A chart doesn't predict an accident or an illness; astrology hasn't been shown scientifically to do that. If you're worried about your health, see a doctor. Mars's position is an exact calculation. The meanings given to it come from a symbolic tradition.
Look at your own Mars
Draw your birth chart and find your Mars's sign, its house and the aspects it makes in the list. Then ask yourself: when I really want something, what do I do first, and what's my first reaction when something blocks the way?
