Mounts of the hand
The mounts of the hand are the fleshy pads of the palm, found at the base of the fingers and along its edges. Palmistry tradition names them after the planets: Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, Apollo, Mercury, Mars, and the Moon. Their relief, more or less developed, is read as a map of temperaments: each mount lends the hand a tone, from Venusian warmth to lunar imagination.
The map of the seven mounts
Beneath each finger and along the edges of your palm rise small swells of flesh. Tradition places Jupiter beneath the index finger (ambition), Saturn beneath the middle finger (depth), Apollo beneath the ring finger (creativity), Mercury beneath the little finger (exchange). Venus wraps the base of the thumb (the warmth of the heart), the Moon occupies the opposite edge (imagination), and Mars holds the middle (courage).
How to read them
Benham built his whole method on the mounts: for him, the most developed mount named a person’s dominant type. Run your thumb over your palm and feel where the flesh grows full, where it stays discreet. A marked mount would lend its tone to the whole hand, like a note that colors a chord.
Sources
- , The Laws of Scientific Hand Reading (1900)