12 Historical Figures and Celebrities Who Believe They Owe Their Successes (and Downfalls) to Astrology
Lady Gaga can consult astrologists all she wants. We’d prefer our world leaders have more robust inner circles, though.
The Reagans
Ronald says it didn’t have an impact on his governing, but he regularly consulted a celebrity astrologer. Nancy Reagan’s astrologer reportedly helped avoid an assassination, which then opened the floodgates for Nancy to manage Ron’s schedule entirely based on the stars.
Albrecht Von Wallenstein
He was a Catholic general during the Thirty Years War, and as a young man, got his charts read by none other than Johannes Kepler. He relied on his reading for his entire career, and a lot of it appeared to come to fruition — many great successes against Sweden, and several losses so disastrous, he got demoted and even his personal astrologer was like “maybe we shouldn’t see each other anymore.” He even died the year Kepler said he would.
Cleopatra
In her day, Egyptian astrology was akin to a hard science. As luck would have it, there was a lot of throne iconography swirling around the goddess Isis, which Cleopatra used to her advantage, commissioning prominent zodiac murals.
Rudolf Hess
One of Hitler’s top advisers, his team of astrologers told him that it was a great time to engage in peace negotiations with Britain. When he attempted it, his plane crashed, and he was arrested and imprisoned.
Angelina Jolie
She’s consulted astrologers for things like when to have medical procedures, when to release her movies and when to marry Brad Pitt. To solidify her astrology girlie bona fides, she’s said, “I think (Geminis are) mistaken for being of two faces, but we probably have 20, which is probably why a lot of us are actors.”
King Hammurabi
It’s very possible that the study of astrology started during Hammurabi’s reign, and as such, it seems to have featured heavily in his famous Code. He wrote the laws, which were whispered to him by the planet-gods, which people learned about from his laws. Pretty airtight legal system.
Alexander the Great
Alexander is credited with mixing Eastern astrology with Greek mathematics, creating an unholy amalgam that looks like modern astrology. And the fact that astrologers claimed to have used this new concoction to accurately predict Alexander’s death made it irreversibly popular.
Queen Elizabeth I
After her astronomer John Dee accurately predicted that her murderous sister would actually die instead of kill her, he became her right-hand man when she ascended the throne. This guy was a practitioner of iatromathematics, or astrology-based internal medicine. He also dabbled in telescopes and talking to angels.
Lady Gaga
The timing of her “Born This Way Ball” tour was, tragically, shaping up to take place at least partially while Mercury was in retrograde. She worked with a team of spiritual advisors to tiptoe through the unlucky season and, to their credit, it was an extremely lucrative and well-reviewed tour.
Isabel Peron
She became the president of Argentina after her husband appointed her VP and he promptly died. Having zero qualifications, she relied on the tutelage of a mysterious dork called “The Sorcerer,” and together they ran their cruel and inept government based on astrology.
French Presidents
Francois Mitterand saw Charles de Gaulle consult astrologers in the ‘60s, so he did the same thing during his presidency in the ‘90s. Contemporary world leaders were horrified to see him working with his personal astrologer to help navigate the freaking Gulf War. But that turned out fine and nothing bad happened there ever again.
Indira Gandhi
She was a skeptic earlier in her life, but when an astrologer correctly predicted the death of her son, she went full zodiac mode. When she became the prime minister of India, she was very open about her reliance on astrology. She also became extremely paranoid, having her administration interview local astrologers who predicted bad things. All those bummer predictions seem to have piled up, because she was assassinated by her own bodyguards.