1. Twelve Palaces, Twelve Life Domains
A Zi Wei Dou Shu chart divides life into 12 palaces arranged around a wheel: Life, Siblings, Spouse (Marriage), Children, Wealth, Health, Travel, Friends, Career, Property, Wellbeing, and Parents. Every birth chart populates all 12 with stars — nothing is skipped, though some palaces may lack a major star ("empty palace").
2. The Life Palace Is Read First
The Life Palace (命宮) anchors the whole chart. It sits wherever your specific birth hour places it, and every other palace's meaning is ultimately read in relation to it — the Career Palace describes how your core self shows up at work, the Spouse Palace how it shows up in partnership, and so on.
3. Opposite Palaces Are Linked
Each palace has a direct opposite across the wheel that it "faces" — Life faces Travel, Spouse faces Career, Wealth faces Property. Traditional interpretation always checks the opposite palace too, since an empty palace borrows meaning from what sits across from it.
4. Explore Each Palace
Click through to any individual palace page for a full breakdown of what it governs and how to interpret the stars that land there — including the Spouse Palace, most often searched as the "marriage palace," which covers love compatibility and the tone of your marriage.