All Sun-Venus conjunctions from 1900 to 2100. Inferior (retrograde) and superior (direct) conjunctions with zodiac signs and degrees.
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Zodiacal positions of the filtered results
About the Venus Star Point
The Venus Star Point is the heliocentric or geocentric conjunction of Venus and the Sun, marking either an inferior conjunction (Venus passing between Earth and Sun, with Venus retrograde) or a superior conjunction (Venus on the far side of the Sun, with Venus direct). Five inferior and five superior conjunctions fall almost exactly within each eight-year Venus synodic cycle, and these ten points trace out a pentagram across the zodiac. The Star Point is precisely the zodiacal longitude of the Sun (and Venus) at the moment of conjunction.
The synodic period of Venus - the time between successive identical configurations relative to Earth and Sun - is approximately 583.92 days. Five synodic Venus cycles equal 2,919.6 days, which is almost exactly eight tropical years (2,921.94 days), with a residual of just over two days. This near-exact 5:8 resonance is what produces the pentagram traced by Venus conjunctions on the zodiac and explains why the same Venus Star Points recur at almost the same zodiacal degrees every eight years, drifting by only about two days backward each cycle.
An inferior conjunction occurs when Venus passes between the Earth and the Sun; Venus is then retrograde, closest to Earth, and (when geometry permits) may transit the disk of the Sun. A superior conjunction occurs when Venus is on the far side of the Sun, at its greatest distance from Earth and moving direct. The two types alternate within the Venus cycle, separated by roughly 290 and 294 days respectively, and they bracket Venus's appearances as morning star and evening star.
Venus is the morning star (Phosphoros or Eosphoros in Greek, Lucifer in Latin) when it rises before the Sun, an apparition that begins shortly after each inferior conjunction and lasts roughly 263 days. Venus is the evening star (Hesperos in Greek, Vesper in Latin) when it sets after the Sun, beginning shortly after each superior conjunction and lasting a similar period. The transition between these two visibilities is one of the most striking phenomena in pre-telescopic astronomy and is recorded in cultures from Mesopotamia (the Enuma Anu Enlil omens) to Mesoamerica (the Dresden Codex Venus table).
Because five Venus synodic cycles occupy almost exactly eight tropical years, the five inferior conjunctions within any one eight-year cycle fall approximately 144° apart on the ecliptic - one fifth of the zodiac. When these five points are connected in order, they form a perfect pentagram. The same is true of the five superior conjunctions, offset by half a cycle. This pentagrammic geometry was already known to the Babylonians and the Pythagoreans and remains a striking visualisation of orbital resonance.
VSOP87 (Variations Séculaires des Orbites Planétaires, 1987) is a high-precision analytical theory of planetary motion developed at the Bureau des Longitudes in Paris, providing the heliocentric ecliptic coordinates of the major planets accurate to within an arcsecond over several millennia. It is the standard reference used in modern ephemeris software (Swiss Ephemeris, JPL Horizons cross-checks) for computing Venus conjunctions, retrograde phases, and Star Points. The 251 Venus conjunctions tabulated for the years 1900-2100 in this tool are derived from VSOP87 longitudes refined to second-of-time precision.