GENETHLIACI

, in Astrology, are persons who erect horoscopes, or pretend to foretell what shall befall a person, by means of the stars which presided at his nativity.

The ancients called them Chaldæi, and by the general name Mathematici: accordingly, the several civil and canon laws, which we find made against the mathematicians, only respect the Genethliaci, or astrologers.

They were expelled Rome, by a formal decree of the senate; and yet found so much protection from the credulity of the people, that they remained in the city unmolested.

Antipater and Archinapolus have shewn that Genethliology should rather be founded on the time of the conception than on that of the birth.