Born in November

• ScorpioThe Scorpion
• SagittariusThe Archer

A November birthday begins as Scorpio. Between 1920 and 2026 the sun moved into Sagittarius on the 21st of November in 6 years (the first in 2004), the 22nd in 86 and the 23rd in 15 (the last in 1967), in universal time. A birthday on 21 November, 22 November or 23 November is therefore Scorpio or Sagittarius depending on the year, and in the year of a crossing on the hour; the page for each of those dates gives the sign and the moment of the crossing for every year.

Every other date in November had one sign all day in every one of those years: Scorpio up to the 20th and Sagittarius from the 24th.

In the astrological tradition Scorpio is a water sign and a fixed one, ruled by Mars, and by Pluto in modern astrology. Printed tables give it as 23 October – 21 November; between 1920 and 2026 the sun entered it on the 22nd, 23rd or 24th of October and left it on the 21st, 22nd or 23rd of November.

In the astrological tradition Sagittarius is a fire sign and a mutable one, ruled by Jupiter. Printed tables give it as 22 November – 21 December; between 1920 and 2026 the sun entered it on the 21st, 22nd or 23rd of November and left it on the 21st or 22nd of December.

Topaz was November's only stone on the list drawn up in 1912, and citrine joined it later, so the month now has two yellow stones, one of which is often not yellow. Topaz comes in many colours, and almost all the blue topaz sold today began as colourless topaz, irradiated and then heated to turn it blue. Citrine is yellow quartz and rare in nature; most of it on the market is amethyst heated until it turns golden. In the nineteenth century it was sold under names such as Scotch topaz, as a cheaper stand-in for the stone it now shares a month with.

The 1912 list is the one the National Association of Jewelers adopted at Kansas City that August, as G. F. Kunz printed it in The Curious Lore of Precious Stones (1913), with a birth-stone for each month and an alternate for some; today's list is the one GIA publishes. The two lists compared →

The chrysanthemum is November's flower, and one of the few still in bloom as the northern autumn ends. The florist's chrysanthemum is not a wild species but a hybrid of several Chinese ones, grown in China for well over a thousand years before it reached Europe. In Japan it is the emblem of the imperial family, and the Chrysanthemum Throne is the name for the monarchy itself. In France, Belgium, Italy and much of Catholic Europe it is the flower laid on graves at All Saints, which makes it a flower of mourning there and one to think twice about as a gift.

The meanings usually given today are a summary of the birth-flower lists printed now. The older ones are quoted from the dictionary named, under the heading it prints them. Birth flowers and the language of flowers →