Capricornus Tattoo Meaning

The sea-goat, ambition, and the creature living between earth and water.

Capricornus is the sea-goat — the ancient zodiac creature with the foreparts of a goat and the tail of a fish, the being that lives between earth and water, one of the oldest named constellations, associated with ambition, the climb, and the boundary between two worlds. To carry Capricornus is to carry the sea-goat, ambition, and the creature living between earth and water — the goat that climbs and the fish that swims joined in one being, the Babylonian goat-fish of wisdom and fresh water, the zodiac sign of the disciplined ascent.

Capricornus is one of the oldest named constellations in the world. Known in Babylon as MUL.SUHUR.MAS — the Goat-Fish — it is documented in Babylonian star catalogues as early as around 3000 BCE, a figure of the night sky already recognized and named at the dawn of recorded astronomy, some five thousand years ago. The Babylonians saw in this group of stars a hybrid creature, the goat-fish, and the form has endured ever since as the sea-goat of the zodiac.

The Babylonian sea-goat (suhurmāšu) was a divine hybrid creature associated with the great god Enki (called Ea by the Akkadians) — the god of wisdom, of magic, and of the fresh water beneath the earth, the subterranean waters (the Apsu) that were the source of springs and rivers and of life-giving wisdom. The goat-fish was Enki's creature, joined to this god of the deep fresh waters and of wisdom. And its form expressed its nature perfectly: it is the creature that bridges land and water, goat above and fish below — the upper body of a goat, a creature of the mountains and the dry land, joined to the lower body and tail of a fish, a creature of the waters. The goat-fish thus unites the realm of the earth and the realm of the water in a single being, bridging the two, fitting for the creature of Enki, the god whose fresh waters lie beneath the land. Capricornus is this ancient goat-fish: one of humanity's oldest constellations, the divine hybrid of Enki, the being that joins the goat of the heights and the fish of the depths. The Babylonian Capricornus is the Goat-Fish (suhurmāšu) — one of the oldest constellations, the creature of Enki, god of wisdom and the fresh waters beneath the earth. The Babylonian Capricornus is the goat-fish of Babylon — the constellation known in Babylon as MUL.SUHUR.MAS (the Goat-Fish), documented in Babylonian star catalogues as early as c. 3000 BCE, one of the oldest named constellations in the world; the Babylonian sea-goat (suhurmāšu) a divine hybrid associated with Enki/Ea, the god of wisdom and the fresh water beneath the earth — the creature that bridges land and water, goat above and fish below, uniting the realm of the earth and the realm of the water in a single being, the ancient goat-fish of the god of the deep fresh waters.

The Babylonian Goat-Fish (suhurmāšu) is one of the oldest documented constellation figures — the MUL.APIN star catalogue (c. 1000 BCE, but recording older tradition) lists it as a distinct constellation. The association with Enki/Ea (the Sumerian/Babylonian god of wisdom and the abzu — the fresh water beneath the earth) gives the sea-goat a specific theological meaning in Mesopotamian tradition: the creature of the boundary between the dry land and the underground water that feeds it. Pan's transformation at the assault of Typhon: documented in Hyginus's Astronomica (c. 1st–2nd century CE) and in later mythographic sources — the story explains why Capricornus is depicted as half-goat, half-fish. The December solstice traditionally occurred in Capricornus in antiquity (the 'Tropic of Capricorn' is named for this, though precession has since shifted the solstice out of the constellation). Saturn is the traditional planetary ruler of Capricorn in astrology — Saturn's association with time, limitation, and achievement connects to the sea-goat's patient traversal of boundaries.

Capricornus across cultures

Related symbols