Why do they need so much attention?

Are Cancer and Leo compatible?

Cancer and Leo are a semi-sextile: water and fire, cardinal and fixed, one sign apart on the zodiac wheel. It is not one of Ptolemy’s five classical aspects; astrologers call it a minor angle. That is the Sun-sign answer, shared by everyone born under these signs. The personal answer sits in Venus, Mars, the Moon and the descendant.

You're here because of someone.

The Sun signs say not quite. Two whole charts say far more.

Your card is worked out from the day, the minute and the place you were born, not from a sign you share with a twelfth of the planet.

Every Cancer and every Leo reads this page. Only your card knows you.

Find out your true compatibility.

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Admit one Cancer Water · Cardinal Jun 22 – Jul 22

Admit one Leo Fire · Fixed Jul 23 – Aug 22

⚺︎ Semi-sextile · 30°Water + fire · cardinal + fixedA minor aspect, added long after Ptolemy

What it is: synastry, the art of comparing two charts

Comparing two people's charts has a name: synastry. Astrologers lay one chart over the other and look at the angles between the two sets of planets, the same angles the old books use inside a single chart.

Sun-sign compatibility is the shortcut version. It compares only the two Suns, and the angle between them is the aspect: four signs apart is a trine, two apart a sextile, three apart a square, six apart an opposition. Ptolemy called the trine and the sextile harmonious, and the square and the opposition disharmonious. ¹

Elements describe temperament (fire, earth, air, water) and modes describe pace (cardinal starts, fixed holds, mutable adapts). A pair can share one, both or neither. Cancer and Leo share neither.

Full synastry goes much further: whose Venus lands on whose Moon, where one person's planets fall in the other's houses, how the two descendants line up. Ptolemy himself compared the Sun and the Moon of both charts, not just the Suns. That is why the same Cancer can get on beautifully with one Leo and not at all with another. ²

Why do Cancer and Leo feel so close and so far apart?

The traditional portrait: the same for every Cancer and every Leo.

Cancer in love

Cancer loves the way it cooks: generously, for keeps, with leftovers. The old portrait is protective and sentimental, keeping every card and remembering every date, and slow to trust because it's been hurt before. Traditionally a Cancer wants to be someone's home. Hurt one, the books warn, and the shell comes down for a while.

Leo in love

Traditionally, Leo courts out loud: flowers sent to the office, the big gesture, the good table at the good restaurant. The old books say a Leo in love is generous and protective, wants to be admired by the person they admire, and does not do lukewarm. Ignore a Leo, the story goes, and you'll find out what a sulking lion looks like.

Together

Fire and water. Astrologers have argued about this pair for two thousand years. Fire says it out loud; water feels it first and says it later, if at all. Steam, or smoke?

Cardinal meets fixed. One starts things. The other keeps them going, or keeps them exactly where they were.

The Moon's sign sits right next to the Sun's, and the two lights of the sky have been paired since Ptolemy. Cancer wants to look after Leo. Leo wants to be looked at. On a good night those turn out to be the same thing.

Where it comes from: comparing charts, from Babylon to your phone

Era by era, with sources. More in the Reading Room.

Ancientc. 450 BCEThe Babylonian zodiac settles into twelve equal zones, the frame later comparisons of signs are built on. ³
Ancient410 BCEThe earliest known horoscopes, from Babylon and Nippur, date to this year. ³
ClassicalRoman eraBoth signs come out of the same story in Greek and Roman star lore. The Lion is the beast of Nemea that Hercules killed as his first labour; the Crab snapped at his foot while he fought the Hydra, and Juno put it in the sky for its trouble. ^4,5
Classical2nd century CEPtolemy's Tetrabiblos names the aspects between signs and calls the trine and sextile harmonious, the square and opposition disharmonious. ^6,1
Classical2nd century CEPtolemy explains why the Sun and Moon got neighbouring signs: Cancer and Leo sit nearest the top of the northern summer sky, so the two lights took the two warmest signs, the Moon Cancer and the Sun Leo. ¹
Classical2nd century CEPtolemy calls signs one apart disjunct, or alien: they share none of his aspects. Neighbours, he says, are turned away from one another. ¹
Classical2nd century CEIn his chapter on marriage, Ptolemy compares two charts: the Sun and Moon of one against the Sun and Moon of the other, reading trines and sextiles between them as concord and squares and oppositions as friction. ²
Classical2nd century CEHis chapter on friends and enemies does the same with the Sun, the Moon, the rising degree and the Lot of Fortune of both people. ²
Medieval12th centuryAbu Ma'shar's introduction to astrology circulates in Latin; the University of Edinburgh holds a 12th-century copy. ⁷
1800s1890Alan Leo's Astrologer's Magazine offers its annual subscribers a free horoscope by post. ⁸
1930s1937R. H. Naylor's newspaper horoscope, begun in 1930, is organised by the twelve sun signs. ⁹
1970s1978Linda Goodman's Love Signs is published by Harper & Row. ¹⁰
1980s–90s1980–1999Chart services run by computer arrive: Astrodienst in Zürich sells birth charts from 1980 and goes online in 1996. ¹¹
Today202430% of US adults consult astrology, tarot or a fortune teller at least yearly, mostly for fun, according to Pew Research Center. ¹²

Worked out, not guessed

Cancer is sign 4 of 12 and Leo is sign 5: one sign apart, 30°. Semi-sextiles always share nothing the old system counts: element, mode and polarity all differ. Of the 78 possible sun-sign pairings, 12 are semi-sextiles.
Venus never gets more than about 47° from the Sun, so a Cancer's Venus is in one of five signs (Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo or Virgo) and a Leo's in one of five (Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo or Libra). Which one is a matter of the year and the day.

Why does it feel like they don’t see what you do for them?

The Sun can’t answer that. These four can, and your card reads every one of them.

Venus · how you love

How do you love, and how do they want to be loved?

That's Venus. It never strays far from the Sun, so a Cancer's Venus can only sit in Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo or Virgo, and a Leo's Venus can only sit in Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo or Libra. Two people with the same sun sign can want completely different evenings.

Your card reads your Venus.
Mars · what you want

Why do you fight about feeling appreciated?

That's Mars: desire, temper, the way you chase what you're after. It can sit in any of the twelve signs, so two Leos born a season apart can want, and fight about, completely different things.

Your card reads your Mars.
The Moon · what you need

Why do they feel like home one day and a stranger the next?

That's the Moon: what you need when the door's shut and the day's gone wrong. It changes sign every two and a half days. If their Moon falls in your sign… well.

Your card reads your Moon.
The descendant · who you’re drawn to

Why do you keep falling for the same type?

That's your descendant, the edge of the seventh house: the sign setting in the west at your birth minute. Tradition reads it as the partner you keep noticing. It needs your birth time and place.

Your card reads your rising sign and your descendant.