D27 Bhamsa Chart: Saptavimshamsa and the Nakshatra Link

The D27 divides every sign into 27 slices of 1°06′40″. Its starting rule looks like four separate cases, one per element, yet the parts it produces fit together end to end into a single sequence that runs from 0° Aries all the way to 30° Pisces without a break. That sequence turns over at exactly the places where one nakshatra ends and the next begins, which is why the chart carries the name nakshatramsha. Everything below is computed from the Parashari rule and checked part by part.

D27 Chart in Astrology: Saptavimshamsha, Bhamsha, Nakshatramsha (सप्तविंशांश)

Saptavimshati is twenty-seven, so the saptavimshamsha is the chart of twenty-seventh parts. Its two other names, bhamsha and nakshatramsha, both point to the asterisms: the zodiac has 27 nakshatras, the same number as the parts in each sign. The Parashari list of sixteen divisional charts, laid out together on the shodashvarga hub, files the D27 under “strength and weakness”. That is the tradition’s heading for the chart, and this page treats it as a heading only. It does not turn a D27 sign into a statement about anyone’s body, health or stamina, and it attaches no strength score to any cell.

The Element Rule for the First Part

The first 1°06′40″ of a sign takes a sign fixed by the element of the rashi. After that, each part steps one sign forward.

• Fire signs (Aries, Leo and Sagittarius): the first part is Aries.
• Earth signs (Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn): the first part is Cancer.
• Air signs (Gemini, Libra and Aquarius): the first part is Libra.
• Water signs (Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces): the first part is Capricorn.

So the three signs of one element share an identical row of 27 D27 signs. Only Aries and Libra open on themselves; Taurus, for instance, opens on Cancer, its 3rd.

One Chain of 324 Parts, 27 Rounds

Count the D27 parts of the whole zodiac from 0° Aries as a single list: twelve signs of 27 gives 324. One plain rule describes that whole list: the k-th part (counting from zero) takes the k-th sign after Aries, wrapping past Pisces as often as needed. The Aries row runs Aries, Taurus, Gemini and onward through two full rounds, then three more parts, and finishes on Gemini; Taurus picks up on Cancer, the very next sign. All twelve joins between neighbouring signs carry on by exactly one sign in the same way, so the D27 sign never repeats or skips at a sign boundary. Over the zodiac the chain completes 27 rounds, and every sign turns up 27 times in the full table.

The element rule is that chain seen from inside each sign. Twenty-seven parts move the count 3 signs further than whole rounds would, so the sign i places after Aries starts 3×i signs on from Aries. An advance of three signs per sign brings the start back to Aries after four signs, and the elements also repeat every four signs (fire, earth, air, water), which is why the starting sign can be read off the element. Among the sixteen Parashari charts, the equal-part ones that join up into a single chain are the D7, D9, D16, D20 and D27, besides the trivial D1, and of these the D27 goes round the most times.

Each Nakshatra Holds One Round, Each Pada Three Parts

A nakshatra spans 13°20′, which is exactly 12 D27 parts, and the nakshatras begin at 0° Aries just as the chain does. So each round of the chain coincides with one nakshatra: its first 1°06′40″ is Aries in the D27, its last is Pisces, whatever rashi the nakshatra sits in. The site’s nakshatra table confirms it for all 27, including the nine that straddle two signs. A pada is a quarter of a nakshatra, 3°20′, and so holds 3 parts; in the navamsa a pada is a single part, set out in the D9 guide. The table below works for every nakshatra: measure how far a graha has gone into its nakshatra.

Each pada opens on a movable sign: pada 1 on Aries, pada 2 on Cancer, pada 3 on Libra, pada 4 on Capricorn. The pada fixes which three D27 signs are possible; the exact degree picks one of them. The guide to the 27 nakshatras lists where each one begins.

The Full D27 Table

Because the three signs of an element share a row, the full twelve-by-27 grid fits into four columns. Find the arc that holds the graha’s degree, then read across to the column for the element of its sign.

Own-Sign Parts: Three in Four Signs, Two in the Rest

Twenty-seven parts are two rounds and three left over, so in any row the three signs that begin it appear three times and the other nine twice. A rashi gets three parts carrying its own name only when it is one of its own row’s first three signs. That happens for Aries, Virgo, Libra and Pisces; the other eight signs have two such parts each. In every sign the own-sign parts sit 12 parts, or 13°20′, apart.

• Aries: parts 1, 13 and 25 (0°00′–1°06′40″; 13°20′–14°26′40″; 26°40′–27°46′40″)
• Taurus: parts 11 and 23 (11°06′40″–12°13′20″; 24°26′40″–25°33′20″)
• Gemini: parts 9 and 21 (8°53′20″–10°00′; 22°13′20″–23°20′)
• Cancer: parts 7 and 19 (6°40′–7°46′40″; 20°00′–21°06′40″)
• Leo: parts 5 and 17 (4°26′40″–5°33′20″; 17°46′40″–18°53′20″)
• Virgo: parts 3, 15 and 27 (2°13′20″–3°20′; 15°33′20″–16°40′; 28°53′20″–30°00′)
• Libra: parts 1, 13 and 25 (0°00′–1°06′40″; 13°20′–14°26′40″; 26°40′–27°46′40″)
• Scorpio: parts 11 and 23 (11°06′40″–12°13′20″; 24°26′40″–25°33′20″)
• Sagittarius: parts 9 and 21 (8°53′20″–10°00′; 22°13′20″–23°20′)
• Capricorn: parts 7 and 19 (6°40′–7°46′40″; 20°00′–21°06′40″)
• Aquarius: parts 5 and 17 (4°26′40″–5°33′20″; 17°46′40″–18°53′20″)
• Pisces: parts 3, 15 and 27 (2°13′20″–3°20′; 15°33′20″–16°40′; 28°53′20″–30°00′)

The same agreement between rashi and navamsa has its own name and page, vargottama; the arcs above are the D27’s version and are narrower.

D27 Chart Calculator, by Hand

Take a graha at 19°25′ Scorpio. By the table: 19.42 divided by 1.1111 is 17.48, so it sits in part 18, the 18°53′20″–20°00′ arc. Scorpio is a water sign and starts on Capricorn, its 3rd; 17 steps on from Capricorn lands on Gemini.

By the nakshatra: Jyeshtha begins at 16°40′ Scorpio, so the graha is 2°45′ into it, in pada 1 (see the Jyeshtha pada 1 page for that arc). In the nakshatra table that distance falls in the 3rd row, which is Gemini again. The two routes have to agree, and checking one against the other is a quick way to catch a slip. For the degrees themselves, a free kundli prints the lagna’s sign and degree, and the Kundli report gives every graha’s.

Why the D27 Lagna Needs a Careful Birth Time

At 1°06′40″ a part, the D27 is three times finer than the navamsa and coarser than the D45 or the D60. The lagna sweeps through degrees much faster than any graha moves, so a modest error in the recorded birth time can carry the lagna across a part boundary and change the D27 lagna, while the grahas’ D27 signs, moving far more slowly, are much less exposed to the same error. Since the chain has no jumps, the change at any one boundary is to the neighbouring sign.

What This Page Does Not Do

It reports the Parashari construction of the D27 and the patterns that follow from it, and stops there. No D27 sign is read here as physical strength, frailty or a health condition, nothing is forecast, and no cell is scored or ranked. Rules from other schemes for the twenty-seventh division are not covered. Reading a D27 in a real chart is a judgement made by whoever is reading the whole horoscope, and the grid above cannot stand in for it.