Whole-sign house assignment
Maha’s production house convention: the entire sidereal ascendant sign is house one and subsequent signs follow in order.
Calculation contract · released 2026-08-18
Definition
Whole-sign houses divide the zodiac into twelve sign sectors; the sign containing the ascendant becomes the first house regardless of ascendant degree.
Calculation procedure
Classify the sidereal ascendant sign, assign it house one, count signs cyclically, and place every point according to its sidereal sign index.
Required inputs
- Sidereal ascendant longitude
- Sidereal point longitudes
- Named zodiac and ayanāṁśa
Maha convention
Maha’s Jyotiṣa natal and corporate calculations use Lahiri sidereal whole-sign houses and traditional seven-planet sign rulers.
Uncertainty and edge cases
A small ascendant error matters little within a sign but changes every house at the ascendant sign boundary.
What this does not establish
Whole-sign simplicity does not prove the associated house interpretations.
Authoritative references
These sources establish the calculation vocabulary, data product, or transformation convention. They do not establish astrological interpretation.
- Swiss Ephemeris general documentation
Astrodienst AG · 2.10 documentation, checked 2026-08-18
An independent ephemeris implementation, supported reference choices, house calculations, and its dual-license boundary.
Boundary: Maha does not bundle or call Swiss Ephemeris in production. Frozen conformance results are validation evidence, not permission to redistribute its software or data.