In the program "Historically yours" on Europe 1, Monday afternoon, the journalist David Castello-Lopes returned to the birth of the essential horoscope.
With, at the beginning, an English astrologer who took advantage of a precise prediction almost a century ago to become a real star across the Channel.
Journalist David Castello-Lopes, in the program
Historically yours
on Europe 1, looks back every day on the origins of an object or a concept.
This Monday afternoon, he is interested in the phenomenon of the horoscope.
Extremely consulted, as awaited by its followers as mocked by its detractors, these forecasts based on astrology are intriguing and date back, in their current form, to the 1930s.
“You've probably seen those scenes, usually on vacation, where you buy a magazine and someone rushes in to go straight to the horoscope page. And say, right after reading it, 'it' is crazy how it is true what is marked, no but I do not say that I believe in it but still it is disturbing '.
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As usual, you have to ask yourself what is behind these horoscopes.
This comes from astrology, that is to say the activity which consists in studying the relationship between the position of the stars at the time of our birth and the traits of our personality.
Basically, this activity is 4,000 years old.
Newspaper horoscopes, on the other hand, are much more recent and date from the 1930s. Before that time, it was occasional that we publish the horoscopes of famous people.
The turning point of an airship crash
The English astrologer Richard Naylor is considered to be the originator of the modern horoscope.
On August 24, 1930, he published in the
Sunday Express
the birth chart of the younger sister of the Queen of England, Princess Margaret.
He then predicted a busy life for her, which happened.
As usual, astrologer Richard Naylor didn't get much wet either.
'Busy' is not very precise and it often happens to princesses.
People loved it though, and the newspaper asked Richard Naylor to keep making predictions.
A few weeks later, he was more specific in saying that between 'October 8 and 15, an English aircraft would be in danger'.
Indeed, a British airship crashed near Paris.
Of course, the accident took place on October 5, but his reputation was made.
From there, Richard Naylor was entitled to one article per week, dubbed 'What The Stars Foretell', 'Ce que les étoiles predict' in French, in which he said what would happen to people whose birthdays fell. that week.
However, this only concerned a small part of the people.
28,000 letters per week
A few years later, Richard Naylor (or his editor-in-chief) had an idea: to concentrate on the signs of the zodiac which, according to astrologers, allow generalities to be made over periods of one month and not of one single day.
From there it was imitated in every way.
Richard Naylor became a star in England and received up to 28,000 letters per week.
The funny thing about this story is that this newspaper version of astrology is not only looked down upon by skeptics but also by more serious astrologers, who consider it an insult to their art. "