Shatabhisha is the twenty-fourth of the 27 nakshatras, spanning 6 degrees 40 minutes to 20 degrees of sidereal Aquarius. Its ruling planet is Rahu, the Moon's north node, its presiding deity is Varuna, the ancient lord of the cosmic waters and keeper of the hidden order of things, and its symbol is an empty circle. The name translates as "a hundred physicians", and healing runs through everything this star touches. A person born with the Moon in this span has Shatabhisha as their janma nakshatra, or birth star, and is read in the classical tradition as private, perceptive, and unconventional. Their Vimshottari dasha, the planetary timeline of life, opens in an 18-year Rahu period.
This page goes deep on Shatabhisha alone. For the system itself, why there are 27 nakshatras and how padas and lords work, start with the 27 nakshatras of Vedic astrology and come back.
Shatabhisha at a glance
The quick facts first. Everything in this table is unpacked in the sections that follow.
| Attribute | Shatabhisha |
|---|---|
| Position | 6°40′ to 20°00′ Aquarius (Kumbha) |
| Order | 24th of 27 |
| Ruling planet (lord) | Rahu |
| Deity | Varuna, lord of the cosmic waters |
| Symbol | An empty circle |
| Marker star | A faint circlet in Aquarius, usually identified with Gamma Aquarii |
| Gana (temperament) | Rakshasa (fierce) |
| Nature | Chara (movable) |
| Starting dasha | Rahu mahadasha, 18 years |
Where Shatabhisha sits in the sky
Shatabhisha occupies the middle of Aquarius and is one of the nakshatras contained entirely within a single sign, so every Shatabhisha Moon is also an Aquarius Moon. Its stars are faint, a loose scatter in the water-bearer usually anchored to Gamma Aquarii, and the dimness suits a star whose business is what cannot easily be seen.
The placement layers two slow influences on one stretch of sky. The Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra gives Saturn a moolatrikona, a position of near-greatest strength, in the first 20 degrees of Aquarius, and the whole of Shatabhisha sits inside that span. So the sign answers to Saturn at his strongest while the star itself answers to Rahu. The tradition reads the combination as depth doubled: Saturn's patience underneath, Rahu's appetite for the unconventional on top.
Varuna, the empty circle, and the hundred physicians
Shatabhisha's presiding deity is Varuna, one of the oldest gods in the Vedic pantheon, lord of the cosmic waters and guardian of rita, the hidden order that keeps the universe lawful. Varuna sees what is concealed, binds what breaks the law, and heals what he chooses to release. Secrecy, justice, and medicine all sit in his portfolio.
The symbol is an empty circle, read variously as a veil, an enclosure, or the thousand faint stars of the asterism arranged in a ring around nothing visible. Pair it with the name, a hundred physicians, and the star's character comes into focus: a boundary drawn around a mystery, and the patient skill needed to work inside it. This is the nakshatra of the healer, the researcher, and the keeper of confidences, the person trusted precisely because they do not tell.
The personality of a Shatabhisha Moon
Classical descriptions in the Brihat Jataka sketch the Shatabhisha-born as truthful, plain in speech to the point of bluntness, and able to outlast opposition. The signature gift is penetration: a mind that is not satisfied with the official explanation and keeps working until it reaches the mechanism underneath.
Because the Moon in Jyotish is the mind, the birth star colours the inner life above all. A Shatabhisha Moon tends to be private, self-contained, and most comfortable working alone or in small trusted circles. Medicine, healing arts, research, astrology itself, and any field with a closed door and a hard problem behind it suit this star. Solitude here is not loneliness; it is the working condition.
The heavier register is the same trait overgrown: reserve can become isolation, scepticism can become distance, and blunt truth can land harder than intended. The tradition pairs each with its balance: chosen company instead of crowds, Saturn's sign lending structure to Rahu's restlessness, and the rest of the chart, especially a warm Moon dispositor or Jupiter, keeping the circle open at one point. Managed, the privacy is simply depth.
The four padas of Shatabhisha
Each nakshatra divides into four padas of 3 degrees 20 minutes, and each pada corresponds to one navamsa sign, which is how the birth star feeds the ninth divisional chart. Shatabhisha's padas run from Sagittarius to Pisces in the navamsa, all four within the Aquarius Moon sign.
| Pada | Degrees of Aquarius | Navamsa sign | Flavour |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 6°40′ to 10°00′ | Sagittarius | The seeker: philosophy meets the healing instinct, the widest curiosity |
| 2 | 10°00′ to 13°20′ | Capricorn | The clinician: method, discipline, and results you can verify |
| 3 | 13°20′ to 16°40′ | Aquarius | Vargottama; the purest expression, independent and reform-minded |
| 4 | 16°40′ to 20°00′ | Pisces | The intuitive healer: compassion working alongside the analysis |
The third pada deserves its note: a planet between 13 degrees 20 minutes and 16 degrees 40 minutes of Aquarius sits in Aquarius in the navamsa as well. That repetition is called vargottama, and the tradition reads it as reinforcing the placement's stability, the star's character written twice.
Shatabhisha and your dasha timeline
The lord of the birth star opens the Vimshottari dasha, the 120-year cycle of planetary periods laid out in the Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra. For Shatabhisha that lord is Rahu, so a Shatabhisha birth begins inside a Rahu mahadasha of 18 years. The balance at birth is proportional: a Moon at the star's first degree leaves nearly the full 18 years, while a Moon near 20 degrees of Aquarius leaves only a fraction before Jupiter's period begins.
A long opening period is simply a long first chapter, and the tradition reads Rahu's chapter as a season of unconventional growth: unfamiliar places, unfamiliar methods, and ambitions that do not follow the family script. The fixed sequence then continues with Jupiter (16 years), Saturn (19), Mercury (17), Ketu (7), Venus (20), Sun (6), Moon (10), and Mars (7). To find your own entry point, the find your nakshatra page calculates it from your birth details.
Shatabhisha in compatibility matching
In guna milan, the koota matching used for marriage, several of the 36 points come from the two birth stars. Shatabhisha counts as a rakshasa gana star, the temperament class usually translated as fierce. The label marks instinct and intensity rather than character, and carries no judgment; rakshasa-gana stars score full points with one another, and gana is one koota among eight.
A full match also counts nadi, yoni, and the relationship between the two Moon signs, which for Shatabhisha is always read from Aquarius. No single star decides a match, and the classical method spreads its 36 points across eight factors so that none can. To run the complete table for two charts, use the kundli matching tool.
Shatabhisha in the classics
The attributions on this page are the stable, named ones: the Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra carries the 27-star scheme, the moolatrikona spans, and the Vimshottari sequence seeded from the birth star; the Brihat Jataka describes the temperament of those born under each star. The old texts are brief, and this page keeps to what they hold.
Reading further is best done sideways and upward: sideways to Shatabhisha's neighbours, the drum-beating Dhanishta before it and the fire-pillar Purva Bhadrapada after it, whose loud and hot characters make Shatabhisha's stillness easy to see, and upward to the 27-nakshatra map. To see where your own Moon falls, run a free birth chart and find the nakshatra column.