Tritiya tithi is the third day of each lunar fortnight: the Moon between twenty-four and thirty-six degrees ahead of the Sun in the bright half, or between 204 and 216 degrees in the dark half. On Shukla Tritiya the crescent is plainly visible in the west after sunset and stays up a couple of hours; on Krishna Tritiya the Moon, still mostly lit, rises around two hours after dark. Each half takes about one birth in thirty, so together roughly one birth in fifteen falls on this tithi. It is the tithi of Gauri, the goddess Parvati, and so the tithi of Akshaya Tritiya and the Teej festivals. This article covers what it means to be born on tritiya tithi, what the Moon is doing in each half, the classical associations, and what weight any of it carries next to the rest of the chart shown by the kundali calculator.
The tithi before is Dwitiya, the day of the first crescent, and the one after is Chaturthi, the first of the Rikta tithis.
Conventions used. The birth tithi is the one running at the moment of birth, read from how far the Moon has moved ahead of the Sun, in steps of twelve degrees. Sign placements use the Lahiri ayanamsa. The shares below come from Swiss Ephemeris positions for random moments across 1950 to 2010, and the Akshaya Tritiya figures from every Vaishakha Shukla Tritiya in the same years.
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A consultation reads your birth tithi together with the Moon's sign, nakshatra and strength, the lagna and its lord, and the dasha you are running, and shows what the chart itself promises.
In this article
- Tritiya tithi at a glance
- Where the Moon stands at Shukla Tritiya
- Where the Moon stands at Krishna Tritiya
- Gauri, the goddess of the third day
- Jaya: the tithis of victory
- Mars as the tithi’s planet
- Leo and Capricorn: the burnt signs
- Akshaya Tritiya and the two exalted luminaries
- The Teej and Gauri festivals
- Tritiya in KP practice
- Two Tritiya births
- Frequently asked questions
Tritiya tithi at a glance
The tritiya tithi meaning is simply the third. The Muhurta Chintamani assigns it to Gauri, it belongs to the Jaya group of tithis along with Ashtami and Trayodashi, and some lists call it Balaprada, the giver of strength. In the common weekday scheme of tithi lords it falls to Mars. Its shunya signs are Leo and Capricorn. Each half claimed 3.3 percent of the births in the random sample, so a Tritiya birth is about as common as any other tithi.
Where the Moon stands at Shukla Tritiya
By Shukla Tritiya the Moon has pulled well clear of the Sun. In 90 percent of shukla tritiya births it sits in the sign after the Sun’s, with a few per cent in the Sun’s own sign and a few in the sign after that. It is four to ten percent lit, still counted weak by phase until the eighth day, but growing quickly now, and the tradition reads that growth into the person: an inner life that strengthens steadily from a modest start, an appetite for effort, and a willingness to work toward results rather than expect them. Because the Moon so often sits in the second sign from the Sun, the pair frequently straddles two houses in the chart, which ties the matters of those two houses together in the reading. By the end of the tithi the Moon is about a tenth lit, and in the evening sky it is an unmistakable crescent that stays up well into the night’s first hours.
Where the Moon stands at Krishna Tritiya
On Krishna Tritiya the Moon is 204 to 216 degrees ahead of the Sun, around 90 to 96 percent lit and still strong by phase. In 91 percent of krishna tritiya births it sits in the eighth sign from the Sun, the rest in the seventh or ninth. The eighth-from-the-Sun position is worth noting in a reading, since the Moon and the Sun then occupy houses in a six-eight relationship, a strained angle between what a person wants for themselves and how they feel. With a full, benefic Moon it usually works as a drive to reconcile the two rather than a conflict that stays open.
Gauri, the goddess of the third day
Gauri is Parvati in her radiant, auspicious form, the wife who won Shiva through years of austerity and the goddess of a steady, devoted marriage. That is why so many observances kept by women for their husbands and households fall on a Tritiya, and why the tithi is associated in the tradition with devotion that persists, grace, and relationships built to last. As a birth tithi the association is loose but recognisable in practice: people born on Tritiya are often loyal, persistent in what they commit to, and more patient than their energy suggests. None of that tells you whether a given marriage will be happy, which is a question for the seventh house and its lord.
Jaya: the tithis of victory
The five classes of tithi repeat three times in each fortnight, and Tritiya opens the Jaya class, the tithis of victory, followed by Ashtami and Trayodashi. In muhurta, Jaya tithis are chosen for contests, disputes, confronting opponents and difficult undertakings that need resolve, and a Jaya tithi falling on a Tuesday, the day of Mars, is counted Siddha, especially fortunate. For a person born on the day, the Jaya quality usually reads as competitiveness and a dislike of losing, useful in careers built on effort and sometimes a source of friction at home.
Mars as the tithi’s planet
In the scheme that gives the tithis planetary lords in weekday order, Tritiya and Ekadashi belong to Mars. The fit with the Jaya class is obvious, and it adds a reason to look closely at Mars in a Tritiya chart: its sign, house, aspects and whether it is well placed. A quick first check covers dignity (Mars is at home in Aries and Scorpio, exalted in Capricorn and debilitated in Cancer), house (it does especially well in the growing houses, the 3rd, 6th, 10th and 11th) and the aspects it receives. A strong Mars lets the competitive side of the tithi work cleanly, as drive and courage; an afflicted one can turn the same energy into impatience or quarrels. Either way the verdict comes from Mars itself, not from the tithi.
Leo and Capricorn: the burnt signs
The dagdha or shunya signs of Tritiya are Leo and Capricorn, ruled by the Sun and Saturn. Where the rule is followed, the two houses holding those signs are expected to fall a little short of what they promise, and the Sun and Saturn to give their results with less force as lords. The usual exceptions apply: a lord in a dusthana or retrograde is excused, and malefics sitting in a burnt sign are said to prosper there. In a birth chart it remains a fine adjustment, never a basis for predicting that a house of life will fail.
Akshaya Tritiya and the two exalted luminaries
Akshaya Tritiya, the Shukla Tritiya of Vaishakha, is one of the few days tradition treats as auspicious in itself, one of the sade-teen muhurta, the three and a half days that need no further muhurta. There is an astronomical reason often given for this. In the month of Vaishakha the Sun is normally in Aries, where it is exalted, and on the third day the Moon has usually moved into Taurus, where the Moon is exalted. Across the Akshaya Tritiyas from 1950 to 2010, on average 84 percent of the tithi had the Sun in Aries and the Moon in Taurus at the same time. A child born then begins life with both luminaries at their best, which the site’s pages on the Sun in Aries and the Moon in Taurus describe in detail.
The overlap is not complete. In some years the Sun is already in the last degrees of Aries when the lunar month begins, and by Tritiya it has crossed into Taurus; in others the Moon is still finishing Aries when the tithi opens, or has reached Gemini before it ends. For a birth, what counts is where the two actually stood at the minute of birth, which any chart shows at a glance.
The Teej and Gauri festivals
More festivals fall on Tritiya than on almost any other tithi, and most of them honour Gauri. The table lists the main ones.
| Observance | Tithi | What it honours |
|---|---|---|
| Gangaur | Chaitra Shukla Tritiya | Gauri and Shiva, kept by women in Rajasthan for a happy marriage |
| Akshaya Tritiya | Vaishakha Shukla Tritiya | The undecaying day, for beginnings, gold and giving |
| Hariyali Teej | Shravana Shukla Tritiya | Parvati’s reunion with Shiva in the monsoon |
| Kajari Teej | The Krishna Tritiya after the Shravana full moon | A monsoon Teej of songs and fasting by married women |
| Hartalika Teej | Bhadrapada Shukla Tritiya | Parvati’s penance to win Shiva |
| Third day of Navratri | Ashvin Shukla Tritiya | The goddess Chandraghanta |
For someone born on one of these days, the festival is a lovely thing to share a birthday with, and families often read meaning into it. The chart, though, is made of the planets at the moment of birth, and a Teej birth is judged the same way as any other Tritiya.
Tritiya in KP practice
KP does not use the birth tithi to judge anything. Its predictions come from the sub-lords of the cusps and the significators of each house group, as the site’s guide to sub-lord theory sets out, and the Moon is read through its own sign, star and sub rulers. That applies to the Akshaya Tritiya pair as well: an exalted Sun and Moon give their results in KP through the houses they occupy, own and signify, and a KP reader would not credit the day itself. The same goes for choosing dates. Asked whether Akshaya Tritiya is a good day to buy a house, a KP astrologer would look at the fourth cusp sub-lord in the buyer’s own chart for the 4th, 11th and 12th houses, as the site’s guide to buying property in KP explains, and at the ruling planets of the moment, not at the tithi’s reputation. The tithi remains useful descriptive colour, and nothing more.
Two Tritiya births
A woman born near noon on Akshaya Tritiya, details altered, with Cancer rising. The Sun is at 20 degrees Aries in the tenth house and the Moon at 20 degrees Taurus in the eleventh, thirty degrees ahead: a Shukla Tritiya birth with both luminaries exalted. For Cancer rising the Moon is the lagna lord and the Sun the second lord, so the two strongest planets in the chart are also two of its most personal. Her family made much of the date. She rose through the civil service to run a district administration, and what carried her there is exactly what the date so often supplies, two exalted luminaries, placed in houses of career and gain. Someone born in the same hours with another lagna would have the same pair working in quite different houses.
A man born around sunset, details altered, with Scorpio rising, the Sun at 10 degrees Taurus in the seventh and the Moon at 10 degrees Sagittarius in the second: a Krishna Tritiya birth, with the Moon in the eighth sign from the Sun. Mars, the tithi’s lord and his own lagna lord, sits in its own sign Aries in the sixth house, the house of contests. He was a state-level wrestler in his twenties and now coaches young wrestlers at his district’s sports hostel. The Jaya tithi and its Mars lord describe the temperament, but it is the Mars in its own sign in the sixth that made a career of it.
Frequently asked questions
What is Tritiya tithi?
The third lunar day of each fortnight: the Moon 24 to 36 degrees ahead of the Sun on Shukla Tritiya, or 204 to 216 degrees on Krishna Tritiya. It is the tithi of Gauri.
Is it good to be born on Tritiya tithi?
No tithi is good or bad on its own. Tritiya is a Jaya tithi linked with effort, persistence and devotion, and whether those qualities show strongly depends on the Moon, on Mars and on the lagna.
How does Shukla Tritiya differ from Krishna Tritiya?
On Shukla Tritiya the Moon is a growing crescent, usually in the sign after the Sun’s. On Krishna Tritiya it is still largely full and strong, usually in the eighth sign from the Sun.
Why is Akshaya Tritiya considered so auspicious?
Tradition counts it among the self-auspicious days, and astronomically the Sun is usually exalted in Aries and the Moon exalted in Taurus on that tithi, on average for about 84 percent of it.
Which deity and planet rule Tritiya?
Gauri is its presiding deity in the Muhurta Chintamani, and in the weekday scheme of tithi lords its planet is Mars. It belongs to the Jaya group.
What are the burnt signs of Tritiya?
Leo and Capricorn, ruled by the Sun and Saturn. In a birth chart the rule is a small adjustment with several exceptions, not a verdict on any house.
Which festivals fall on Tritiya?
Gangaur, Akshaya Tritiya, Hariyali Teej, Kajari Teej, Hartalika Teej and the third day of Navratri, most of them honouring Gauri.
A good date is a start. The chart tells the rest.
A consultation reads your Moon and Mars, the lagna and its lord, and the dasha you are in, and places the birth tithi and any festival birthday where it belongs, as context.