Mercury's seventeen years are the years of the mind at work. Mercury brings talk, wit, dealing and adaptability, and its period turns life toward exchange: commerce and accounts, writing and speech, study and teaching, travel and networks, the skilled hand. People in a Mercury mahadasha are busier, quicker and more sociable; they learn new things, change jobs, trade, publish, and think their way out of what force could not solve.
For those born with the Moon in Ashlesha, Jyeshtha or Revati the Mercury period is the first seventeen years of life — a clever, verbal childhood, well schooled when Mercury is strong — and Ketu's brief, strange period follows at about seventeen. For everyone else it comes after Saturn's nineteen heavy years, and it is felt as a lightening: the load is set down, the mind wakes up, and the person becomes interested again in people, ideas and the next thing.
Mercury's house from the lagna directs the years — the 2nd for income through speech and trade, the 3rd for communication and skill, the 5th for study and speculation, the 10th for a career in commerce, writing or technology. Mercury's dignity (exalted in Virgo, debilitated in Pisces) and its company say whether the wit is sharp or scattered; in the 6th, 8th or 12th it brings disputes, worry and nervous strain. Mercury–Mercury, Mercury–Venus and Mercury–Jupiter are the productive antardashas; Mercury–Ketu and Mercury–Mars the erratic ones.
What Mercury brings
Traditionally, Mercury brings talk, wit, dealing, adaptability. A mahadasha is that graha's turn to colour the years: the house it holds from the lagna, the houses it rules and the planets it sits with all say what its 17 years are spent on. The antardasha inside it — each of the nine grahas in turn — sets the shorter weather.
Mercury mahadasha by house
The tradition reads the period first from the house the lord holds in the birth chart, counted from the lagna in whole signs:
- 1st house. A Mercury period from the 1st brings learning, talk and a restless, youthful mind.
- 2nd house. A Mercury period from the 2nd brings income through speech, trade and writing.
- 3rd house. A Mercury period from the 3rd brings communication, short travel and skilled hands.
- 4th house. A Mercury period from the 4th brings study, property dealings and a busy home.
- 5th house. A Mercury period from the 5th brings study, speculation and quick intelligence.
- 6th house. A Mercury period from the 6th brings accounts, disputes and nervous strain.
- 7th house. A Mercury period from the 7th brings partnerships of conversation and commerce.
- 8th house. A Mercury period from the 8th brings research, worry and hidden dealings.
- 9th house. A Mercury period from the 9th brings teachers, degrees and a learned fortune.
- 10th house. A Mercury period from the 10th brings a career in trade, communication or skill.
- 11th house. A Mercury period from the 11th brings gains through networks and commerce.
- 12th house. A Mercury period from the 12th brings study abroad, imagination and miscalculated expense.
The antardashas of Mercury
Each mahadasha is divided among the nine lords in the Vimshottari order, beginning with its own; the length of each is the mahadasha's years times the antardasha lord's, divided by 120:
| Antardasha | Length |
|---|---|
| Mercury–Mercury | 2 years 4 months 27 days |
| Mercury–Ketu | 11 months 27 days |
| Mercury–Venus | 2 years 10 months |
| Mercury–Sun | 10 months 6 days |
| Mercury–Moon | 1 year 5 months |
| Mercury–Mars | 11 months 27 days |
| Mercury–Rahu | 2 years 6 months 18 days |
| Mercury–Jupiter | 2 years 3 months 6 days |
| Mercury–Saturn | 2 years 8 months 9 days |
Who begins life in the Mercury mahadasha
Mercury rules three nakshatras. A natal Moon in any of them starts the cycle in the Mercury mahadasha, with the balance set by how far into the nakshatra the Moon stood: