Mahadasha and antardasha

This duration table opens one 17-year Mercury major period (mahadasha). The approximate month column multiplies each proportional share by 12 so the spans are easy to compare; it does not reproduce software calendar boundaries or choose a dasha-year convention.

| Antardasha | Approximate teaching months | | --- | ---: | | Mercury | 28.9 | | Ketu | 11.9 | | Venus | 34.0 | | Sun | 10.2 | | Moon | 17.0 | | Mars | 11.9 | | Rahu | 30.6 | | Jupiter | 27.2 | | Saturn | 32.3 |

Every mahadasha contains nine antardashas. They begin with the mahadasha lord and follow the same fixed sequence.

For any pair, the teaching proportion is:

major-lord years × sub-lord years ÷ 120

Mercury–Saturn is therefore 17 × 19 ÷ 120 ≈ 2.69 years, or about 32.3 months on this simplified table. Use the calculator's own dates for a real timeline. Astroyana defaults to a solar dasha year; software using a 360-day savana year will turn the same traditional proportions into different calendar boundaries.

Keep both lords on the page

Return to the invented Virgo-rising chart:

• Mercury rules Houses 1 and 10 and sits in Gemini in House 10;
• Saturn is the antardasha lord and sits in House 6; and
• the displayed interval is Mercury–Saturn.

The computed fact is the pair of running lords and their interval. The traditional reading material includes both lords' significations, lordships, placements, condition, and relationship. The inference may be that public work, skill, responsibility, and daily effort overlap as themes. It is not “Mercury gives a job and Saturn delays it.” Planet keywords do not replace this chart.

Read Mercury–Saturn without a verdict

For Mercury–Saturn, first write the two factual records: Mercury major period; Saturn sub-period. Next add the natal roles just listed. Only then write:

During this supplied interval, work, communication, responsibility, and routines are plausible linked themes. The pair alone does not identify a specific workplace event.

That sentence can be inspected. Another reader may contest the inference without pretending the period labels changed.

Try it before you reveal it

Attempt first: in a Mercury–Rahu interval, what must you record before saying the period is favourable or difficult?

Your attemptI made the attempt mentally instead.

Compare your attempt

Worked answer

Record the running pair, then Mercury's and Rahu's natal placements, relevant house ownership, sign-lord context, condition, and relationship in the chosen method. The likely misconception is to import a universal “Rahu is bad” or “Mercury is good” label. A lord's name supplies traditional topics; it does not supply the whole result.

A likely mix-up

Period-lord names do not determine results without their natal roles.

Try a fresh case

Replace Saturn with the supplied Jupiter record and recompute the sub-period.

Change the scene, not the chart

Replace Saturn with Jupiter while keeping the Mercury mahadasha and natal Mercury unchanged. For this exercise, natal Jupiter rules Houses 4 and 7 and sits in House 11. Calculate 17 × 16 ÷ 120 without looking up a calendar date. Then revise the thematic sentence from those supplied natal roles—not a generic “expansion” promise.

The boundary for this table: calculation identifies the two periods and their proportional span. Tradition supplies ways to assess each lord in the natal chart. Interpretation forms a theme from their overlap. Uncertainty remains: the pair proves no event, valence, or exact lived outcome.