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Geomancy · Figure 7 of 16

Acquisitio, Gain: the figure of getting and keeping

Acquisitio, Gain, is the geomantic figure that alternates double and single lines, double at the head: two bowls set upright. The 1655 Of Geomancy gives it Jupiter as the greater fortune, and the tradition reads it as gaining, receiving and holding on.

The figure Acquisitio drawn large: Fire at the head, two points; Air at the neck, one point; Water at the body, two points; Earth at the feet, one point. Below, the sixteen figures small in a row, the 7th marked. Acquisitio · Gain Fire, the head two Air, the neck one Water, the body two Earth, the feet one
Acquisitio, figure 7 of 16: its points head to feet, with the element and part of each line. Below, the sixteen in our order, the eight that can be Judge first.

Facts

Number
Figure 7 of 16; the eight that can be Judge come first
Points, head to feet
2 · 1 · 2 · 1: one point in the Air and Earth lines
Total
6 points, even, so it can be the Judge
Planet (1655)
Jupiter as the greater fortune
Sign (Gerard's scheme)
Aries, in the Astronomical Geomancy attributed to Gerard of Cremona (1655 English)
Cattan's English (1591)
“winning”
Agrippa's glosses (1651)
“Obtaining”, “Comprehended within”
Turned over
Upside down: Amissio. Every point swapped: Amissio

Meaning

Acquisitio is gain in the widest sense: the thing asked for, a friend, knowledge, something received. Cattan's translator renders the name "winning"; Agrippa's table of 1651 glosses it "Obtaining" and "Comprehended within"; Hartmann has "success, obtaining, absorbing, receiving" and "a good figure"; the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn's handbook reads it as very good for gain. It holds on to what it has, so the tradition finds it against the asker only where they want to be rid of something. As the Judge, in the tradition's reading, what is sought is obtained or grows.

In the shield

Acquisitio has six points and can be Judge, for one casting in eight. It is the one figure Cattan names outright as "a figure firme entring in", and that one case is the best clue to how he sorted the figures into entering, going out and "meane": by comparing the head line with the feet. Upside down, or with every point swapped, it becomes Amissio, Loss: the tradition's pair of gain and loss. Its partner under Jupiter is Laetitia. Its head line is double, so as Judge it has no Way of the Point under the modern rule.

Jupiter, and the signs

The 1655 text gives Jupiter both Acquisitio and Laetitia, Acquisitio as the greater fortune; Cattan's table makes it Jupiter direct and Laetitia Jupiter retrograde, and Fludd has the two the other way round. In Gerard's scheme it is Aries, as in Agrippa and Cattan's own table; the Golden Dawn gives it Sagittarius, a sign of Jupiter, and Cattan's page 63 gives Pisces, the other.

Correspondences

Each item with how it stands: “sourced” is in the work cited, “our construction” is EsoTerrier’s own, and “disputed” means the sources disagree.

Planet
Jupiter, in every source checked (Cattan, Agrippa, the 1655 text, Hartmann, Crowley, Fludd) sourced
Direct or retrograde (Cattan, p. 54)
Jupiter direct sourced
Sign, Gerard's scheme (ours)
Aries sourced
Sign, other schemes
Agrippa (1651): Aries; Cattan's table (p. 56): Aries; Cattan's “Gerard Cremon” (p. 63): Pisces; the Golden Dawn (1909): Sagittarius disputed
Quality (Cattan's rule)
Entering, and good (pp. 62, 215) sourced
Lines
Single, active: Air (neck) and Earth (feet); double, passive: Fire (head) and Water (body) sourced
Our keywords
Gain, growth, receiving our construction

How the schools read it

Cattan (1591)
Calls it “winning”; entering, and good (pp. 62, 215).
Agrippa (1651)
Glosses it “Obtaining”, “Comprehended within”.
*Of Geomancy* (1655)
Jupiter as the greater fortune.
Hartmann (1889)
“Acquisitio, Success, obtaining, absorbing, receiving, is a good figure.”
The Golden Dawn (Crowley, 1909)
“Generally very good for […] gain” (its word on profit left out)
Modern practice (Greer, as reported)
Calls it stable, the modern word for an entering figure.
EsoTerrier
Gain, growth, receiving (our one-line reading in the chart).

Claims about it

  • Acquisitio is a figure a person is born under, worked out from a name and a birth date.

    false

    What the record shows: No source makes a geomantic figure from birth data; every casting is for a question. Our own app did this until October 2026, and the method was retired.

  • Acquisitio has one zodiac sign.

    disputed

    What the record shows: Gerard's scheme gives Aries, the Golden Dawn Sagittarius, Cattan's page 63 Pisces. At least six schemes exist; we always name the one we use.

  • Acquisitio has an element of its own.

    disputed

    What the record shows: The sources give the figures at least six different sets of elements. We show only the four line elements, never an element for the whole figure.

Elsewhere on EsoTerrier

Sources

Primary texts (6)
  1. Christopher Cattan, The Geomancie of Maister Christopher Cattan Gentleman, translated by Francis Sparry. London: John Wolfe, 1591 (French original, Paris, 1558). wellcomecollection.org/works/gk8r8xpn
  2. Of Geomancy (attributed to Agrippa) and Astronomical Geomancy (attributed to Gerard of Cremona), in Henry Cornelius Agrippa his Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy, translated by Robert Turner. London, 1655. github.com/textcreationpartnership/A26563
  3. Henry Cornelius Agrippa, Three Books of Occult Philosophy, translated by J. F. London, 1651; Book II, chapter 48. github.com/textcreationpartnership/A26565
  4. Franz Hartmann, The Principles of Astrological Geomancy. London: Theosophical Publishing Society, 1889. archive.org/details/b24884145
  5. [Aleister Crowley], “A Handbook of Geomancy”, The Equinox I(2), 1909, pp. 137 to 161. keepsilence.org/the-equinox/1.2/a-handbook-of-geomancy_low.pdf
  6. Robert Fludd, De naturae simia, second edition. Frankfurt, 1624; De geomantia II.1, pp. 724 to 725. archive.org/details/bub_gb_zINwyYhcsp8C
Studies and other sources (2)
  1. Sam Block, The Digital Ambler, posts on the shield, the Way of the Point, perfection, the elements and the signs, 2012 to 2020. digitalambler.com/2020/05/08/how-to-construct-the-shield-chart-of-geomancy
  2. John Michael Greer, The Art and Practice of Geomancy. San Francisco: Weiser, 2009. Facts only, known through reports.
Our own research (3)
  1. EsoTerrier, geomancy research and validation, 11 to 14 October 2026.
  2. EsoTerrier calculation engine, the geomancy service, its texts and documentation.
  3. EsoTerrier, the geomancy casting screen, catalog line and page brief, rewritten 11 October 2026.
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By EsoTerrier. Written with AI assistance from our research and checked against its sources; last revised 19 October 2026. How we write these pages.

First published ; last revised . Corrections: support@esoterrier.com.