THE STARS OF THE ZODIAC
=Zodiac!=—It sounds to the untrained ear like the password of a
bomb-thrower or a first cousin to a dish of Hungarian goulash.
It is enough, albeit, to scare even a Scout away from the stars, but be
not afraid, for it can’t hurt you and you can’t eat it.
On the other hand, if you are on speaking terms with the zodiac
(pronounced zo´-di-ak), it will help you to find the planets and at the
same time you will add enough new constellations to those you already
know to give you a high passing mark for a merit badge in the Boy
Scouts if you want one. Besides, the signs and constellations of the
zodiac will aid you to use the almanac and help you in many other ways.
You have often noticed that the Sun seems to travel through the sky
over a path or belt that is always the same from west to east; you must
have noticed, too, that the path of the Moon is almost the same as
that of the Sun, but you may or may not remember that the planets also
travel over the same path as the Sun and Moon.
It is just as though the Sun, Moon and planets moved at different
speeds on an endless belt in the sky which runs round the Earth nearly
in a line with its equator, though tilted at a slight angle to it, and
this line is called the _ecliptic_. The way the ancients thought it was
and the way it really looks to us is shown in Fig. 170.
The ancients called this apparent path of the Sun, Moon and planets
with the stars for a background the zodiac, so it is not such a
horrible specimen after all.
We know, of course, that the Sun is the center of our solar system
and that the planets, including the Earth and Moon, are at various
distances from the Sun and that each moves in a path, or orbit, of its
own, making a small angle with the ecliptic. What we call the Zodiac
takes in all these orbits and is, therefore, a belt of considerable
width through the center of which runs the ecliptic.
[Illustration: FIG. 170.—THE ZODIAC AS INVENTED BY THE ANCIENTS.]
[Illustration: FIG. 171.—THE ZODIAC AS WE KNOW IT TODAY.]
Suppose we draw a little circle and call it the Sun, as shown in Fig.
171, and draw an ellipse around it and call it the Earth’s orbit,
putting on another little circle for the Earth; now suppose we draw
a much larger ellipse round the one representing the Earth’s orbit,
divide it into 12 parts and put a constellation in each part.
Knowing now that the Sun, Moon and planets are very near the Earth
when compared with the fixed stars it must be plain that these bodies
when seen from the Earth, which is always changing its position in
its travels round the Sun, would appear to move in and across the
constellations.
Take a look at Jupiter some night when he is moving across any of the
constellations and he will seem to be a part of it; this is the reason
we speak of the Sun or a planet as being in a certain constellation at
a given time.
The stars forming the background of the Moon and the planets can always
be seen, for we are then looking at them from the dark side of the
Earth, but they cannot be seen when they form the background of the
Sun, for the stars are on the other side of him when he gets between us
and them and he shines in our eyes.
These constellations through which the Sun, Moon and planets seem to
pass, or as the almanacs say are _in_, lie in a belt formed by the path
of the Sun and neither the Moon nor the planets ever get farther from
the path of the Sun than 8 degrees on either side of him and this belt
is called the zodiac.
The belt, or zodiac, is divided into 12 equal parts, or spaces, which
were called _signs_ by the ancients and they are still called signs.
This makes the length of each sign, or space, 30 degrees, and hence the
12 signs, which are called the _Signs of the Zodiac_, equal 360 degrees
or a complete circle. (See Chapter X, _The Time o’ Day_.)
The Signs of the Zodiac and the constellations of the Zodiac have
the following names: _Aries_, the Ram; _Taurus_, the Bull; _Gemini_,
the Twins; _Cancer_, the Crab; _Leo_, the Lion; _Virgo_, the Virgin;
_Libra_, the Balance; _Scorpio_, the Scorpion; _Sagittarius_, the
Archer; _Capricornus_, the Goat; _Aquarius_, the Water Bearer, and
_Pisces_, the Fishes. It is in one of these constellations that the
Sun, Moon and planets are always to be found.
A good way to find any one of the constellations is by knowing the time
when it will be on your meridian, that is the line over your head due
north and south, during a given month. Any constellation of the zodiac
will be on your meridian at 9 o’clock P. M., during the month given
opposite its name in the following table:
-----------+------------------+-----------------+-------------------
| | |Time Constellation
Astronomical| How Pronounced | Common Names |will Appear on Your
Names | | |Meridian at 9 P. M.
-----------+------------------+-----------------+-------------------
Aries | A´-ri-es | The Ram | December
Taurus | Tau´-rus | The Bull | January
Gemini | Gem´-i-ni | The Twins | February
Cancer | Can´-cer | The Crab | March
Leo | Le´-o | The Lion | April
Virgo | Vir´-go | The Virgin | May
Libra | Li´-bra | The Balance | June
Scorpio | Scor´-pi-o | The Scorpion | July
Sagittarius| Sag´-it-ta´-ri-us| The Archer | August
Capricornus| Cap´-ri-cor´-nus | The Goat | September
Aquarius | A-qua´-ri-us | The Water Bearer| October
Pisces | Pis´-ces | The Fishes | November
-----------+------------------+-----------------+-------------------
To find any constellation during any other month than that given in the
last column above subtract two hours for each following month. Suppose
you want to find Aries, the Ram, in January instead of December, look
for it on your meridian at 7 P. M.; in February look for it at 5 P. M.,
and so on.
You will of course come to a month where the constellation will run
into daylight and then you won’t be able to see it again until the
Earth has traveled round the Sun to a point where the Earth is again
between the Sun and the constellation.
The constellations of the zodiac are shown in Fig. 172; also the symbol
for each sign and the month in which the sun enters the sign. As we
shall later explain, the constellation is no longer in the sign of the
same name.
If you look southward at the sky some night for any particular
constellation you need not expect the stars which form it to stand
out separate and distinct, as shown in Figs. 172 and 174; if you do
you will be sadly disappointed, for many of the constellations of the
zodiac are hard to recognize compared with the Big Dipper, or Orion, or
Pegasus.
[Illustration: FIG. 172.--CONSTELLATIONS AND SIGNS OF THE ZODIAC.]
Nor are the constellations of the zodiac as equally spaced in the sky
as in Figs. 172 and 174. Some of the stars are very scattered and
stretch over part of two signs of the zodiac, while others do not take
up nearly all the space allowed them; Figs. 172-174 are but rough
sketches. To recognize these constellations you will have to use a good
star map.
The heavy black line drawn lengthwise through the middle of the strip
in Fig. 172 represents the line of the ecliptic which is the yearly
path the Sun seems to take. The planets also take the same course,
though they may be on one side or the other of the Sun’s path by 8
degrees, thus making the zodiac 16 degrees wide; hence, the lighter
parallel lines on either side of the black line, or path of the Sun, is
the farthest away that the planets ever get.
If you were to cut the strip of paper, Fig. 172, out of the book and
paste the ends together, you would have a band, or circle representing
the zodiac more nearly as it is; but instead of cutting the book you
had better draw the signs and constellations on a strip of cardboard
2 inches wide and 24 inches long and glue the ends together, as shown
in Fig. 173; you will now have a zodiac with which you can do a little
experimenting.
[Illustration: FIG. 173.--CARDBOARD ZODIAC.]
Place a candlelight in the center of the cardboard ring and suspend a
marble from a thread, by means of a drop of sealing wax, and let the
marble hang between the light and the cardboard zodiac. As seen from
the marble, which represents the earth, the candle, representing the
sun, is in the constellation directly opposite the one in which the
shadow of the marble falls.
In the almanacs our year begins with January and as the Sun is then in
the sign Aquarius, this month is represented by a picture of Aquarius,
the Water Bearer; but in marking out the signs of the zodiac on a flat
strip of paper we begin with Aries, which the Sun enters in the month
of March, and read them from right to left.
The reason for this is because the Earth travels round the Sun
counter-clockwise as seen from the north and this makes the Sun appear
to move eastward through the constellations of the zodiac.
[Illustration: FIG. 174.--CONSTELLATIONS OF ZODIAC IN CIRCLE.]
This makes all the months follow each other in the proper order when
the strip of paper is glued together, as shown in Fig. 173, or when the
constellations are arranged in a circle, as shown in Fig. 174.
This latter diagram shows plainly that when the Earth is at that part
of its orbit marked A the constellation of Taurus is back of the Sun.
If we are on that side of the Earth which is toward the Sun of course
we cannot see Taurus for the Sun, which is shining in our eyes.
Still Taurus is the background of the Sun just the same, and so when
the almanac says the Sun is in Taurus you will know that the Sun is
directly between the Earth and Taurus.
The same thing is true of all the planets. Take Mars, for example;
whenever Mars is in that part of its orbit so that we can see it at
night, as shown at B, Fig. 172, we also see the constellation back of
it--in this case it is Libra, the Balance--and since a planet and a
fixed star look exactly alike to the naked eye it is easy to think of
Mars as being in that constellation; and it is the same with all the
other planets.
=The Constellations of the Zodiac.=--The _Constellations of the Zodiac_
and the _Signs of the Zodiac_ are two very different things. Long ago,
when the zodiac was invented, the constellation of Aries, the Ram, was
in the first of the 12 spaces and he and the _sign_ of this space were
of course at that time the same.
Owing to a peculiar motion of the Earth, called _precession_, the signs
of the zodiac have moved backward during the last 2,000 years and the
sign of Aries, which used to be in the constellation of Aries, is now
in the constellation of Pisces, the Fishes.
[Illustration]
=Aquarius, the Water Man.=--A constellation of autumn: Aquarius is
always pictured in the almanacs as pouring water from a pitcher.
All the stars of this constellation are faint and scattered and none of
them are in a line with the ecliptic. Aquarius got his name from the
Romans, who called him the _Waterman_ because when the Sun enters the
sign Aquarius in January there are usually heavy rains in Italy and in
the long ago people thought the stars had a lot to do with the weather,
and everything else on Earth, for that matter.
[Illustration: FIG. 175.--CONSTELLATIONS OF ARIES THE RAM.]
=Pisces, the Fishes.=--This constellation is now in that part of the
zodiac whose sign is ♈ (Aries). It is not an interesting constellation
to look at with the naked eye, for its stars are faint and they stream
out in two lines over nearly two signs of the zodiac.
But Pisces is none the less a very important constellation because it
is at one of the points where the line of the equator crosses the line
of the ecliptic.
When the Sun crosses the point where the equator and the ecliptic meet
the days and nights are then equal at all places on the Earth, and
hence we call this time of the year, which is about the twenty-first
of March, the _equinox_, which means equal days; or the _vernal
equinox_, which means equal spring days.
[Illustration]
=Aries, the Ram.=--This constellation used to be in that part of the
zodiac whose sign is ♈ (Aries) but is now in that part whose sign is ♉
(Taurus).
[Illustration]
The position of Aries in the sky is shown in Fig. 175 and you can
easily find him by drawing a line from the North Star to _Alpha_ in
Pegasus and another line at right angles to the first line until you
come to two bright stars quite close together and a third one not quite
so bright. These are the chief stars of the constellation of the Ram.
[Illustration]
=Taurus, the Bull.=--This constellation is now in the sign ♊ (Gemini),
of the zodiac. In Chapter II you will find directions for locating
Taurus. You will remember that the red star Aldebaran forms the right
eye of the Bull. The little group of stars called the _Hyades_ is the
Bull’s face and the Pleiades are in his shoulder.
=Gemini, the Twins.=--It is easy to see why the ancients called this
constellation of the zodiac the Twins, for its two chief stars,
_Castor_ and _Pollux_, are quite close together and while of different
colors they are of about the same brightness.
These two stars are the heads of the Twins and four other stars are
their feet and these stand forever on the Milky Way. The Twins are
easily found since they are next to Taurus, the Bull.
[Illustration]
Gemini is an important constellation, as the Sun reaches its most
northern point in it in summer; this is called the _summer solstice_,
and takes place about June 21. When the Sun has reached this point it
casts the shortest shadow at mid-day and it seems to stand still for a
few days before it takes its downward course. The summer solstice is
halfway between the two points of the equinox.
=Cancer, the Crab.=--This is a small constellation of dull stars that
is chiefly interesting because it once contained the point of the
summer solstice, but that was ages ago.
The only thing about Cancer to attract attention is a hazy patch of
light called the _Manger_. On each side of the Manger is a fairly
bright star and this pair of stars is called the _Ass’s Colts_; they
will help you to find Cancer.
[Illustration]
The Manger has often been mistaken for a comet by those who lit upon it
with the naked eye, but it is really a cluster of small stars.
=Leo, the Lion.=--There are two separate groups of stars that make up
this king of beasts. The first group takes the shape of a _sickle_ and
the other the form of a _square_. The sickle, which is formed of six
bright stars, is Leo’s head and shoulders, and the four stars of the
square make up his hindquarters.
Two lines, drawn from the Big Dipper across the sky, as shown in Fig.
176, will meet the sickle and the square.
[Illustration]
The very bright star in the end of the handle of the sickle is
_Regulus_, which means little king, and far to the other side of the
constellation right in the end of the Lion’s tail is another bright
star called _Denebola_.
[Illustration: FIG. 176.--CONSTELLATIONS OF THE LION AND BIG DIPPER.]
=Virgo, the Virgin.=--This constellation is of interest, because the
Sun again crosses the point where the equator and ecliptic meet, and
the days and nights are again of the same length everywhere on the
Earth, just as they were at the spring, or _vernal equinox_.
But this time, when the Sun is in Virgo, it crosses the equator from
north to south about September 21 and so this _equinox_ is called the
_autumnal equinox_, which means equal autumn days.
[Illustration]
By drawing a line from Polaris through Mizarin through the handle
of the Big Dipper and producing it beyond Arcturus, and on until it
reaches a big, bright, white star you will have reached Virgo, as shown
in Fig. 177. This big, white, bright star is Spica, and it is the chief
star in Virgo.
The ancients always represented Virgo, the Virgin, with a sheaf of
wheat in one hand and a sickle in the other. The Virgin and the harvest
always went together in the minds of the ancients and this accounts for
the pictures of Virgo in the almanacs of the present time.
=Libra, the Balance.=--A small constellation named for the ancient
Roman pound weight.
[Illustration]
The constellation of Libra is not nearly as old as the others in
the zodiac, in fact it is thought that there were only eleven
constellations in the zodiac when they were first mapped out thousands
of years ago, although there were twelve signs or spaces in the zodiac.
Its position is shown in Fig. 178.
Then in the days of the Roman Empire, about 300 years before Christ,
some genius clipped the claws of the Scorpion and made its stars into a
pair of scales. This was a very clever idea, for the autumnal equinox
then took place in this sign of the zodiac, and the stars in this sign
were given the name of Libra, as the equal days and nights called to
mind the balance.
[Illustration: FIG. 177.--CONSTELLATIONS OF VIRGO THE VIRGIN.]
[Illustration: FIG. 178.--LIBRA, LION, SCORPIO, VIRGO.]
=Scorpius, the Scorpion.=--A summer constellation. If Libra takes up
only a small part of one sign of the zodiac Scorpius makes up for it by
nearly covering two signs.
To the old astrologers, Scorpius was the “power of darkness” and the
“accursed constellation,” and when they cast their _horoscopes_ they
attributed to it “woe and discord, war and disease.”
[Illustration]
The constellation of Scorpius is one of the very few which really looks
its part. In the end of its curved tail there are two stars which are
ready to sting if he ever strikes, but he has never struck yet.
The heart of the Scorpion is a big, bright red star called _Antares_,
which means the rival of Mars, and when Mars is in the constellation of
Scorpius it is hard to tell them apart.
Antares will prove useful in finding the Scorpion as there are no other
bright stars in that part of the sky. The position of Scorpius is shown
in Fig. 178.
=Sagittarius, the Archer.=--A summer constellation: It is made up of
many stars which can be seen with the naked eye and is always pictured
in the almanacs as a _centaur_, or man-horse, shooting an arrow from a
bow at the heart of the Scorpion.
[Illustration]
Sagittarius is a fine constellation, right in the path of the Milky
Way, and this makes it easy to find. There are several interesting
things in this constellation and among them are the clusters of stars
and nebulæ.
Then there are seven stars in Sagittarius, which make a little dipper
turned upside down, and because it is in the Milky Way it is called the
_milk dipper_; when you once find it, you will never be able to see
Sagittarius again without seeing the milk dipper.
[Illustration: FIG. 179.--LYRA, AQUILA, CAPRICORNUS.]
The _winter solstice_, that is, the most southern point which the
Sun reaches, lies halfway between the constellations of Scorpius and
Sagittarius and also between the two stream lines of the Milky Way.
When the Sun reaches this point, which is the 20th of December, the
noonday shadows are the longest and the Sun seems to again stand still
until Christmas, when he will begin to move north once more.
=Capricornus, the Sea-Goat.=--A constellation of autumn: On the same
plan that the ancients made Sagittarius a man-horse, so they made
Capricornus a goat-fish.
Though Capricornus is a small and poor constellation when viewed with
the naked eye, the early astrologers thought more of him than all the
other constellations of the zodiac put together.
While the stars of Capricornus do not look anything like a sea-goat, he
can be easily found by drawing a line from Vega in Lyra to Altair in
Aquila and producing it until you come to the zodiac as shown in Fig.
179.
[Illustration]
The two brightest stars of Capricornus are in his head. One of these
stars is a naked eye double, but to many people it will seem merely a
single star. As a matter of fact it is a fine sight test, for it takes
a pair of mighty good eyes to separate them. Another bright star of the
sea-goat is in his fishlike tail.
We have journeyed clear around the great circle which the Sun travels
every year, and we are back again to Aquarius, the constellation we
started from, having covered all the constellations of the zodiac.
=The Signs of the Zodiac.=--Where the signs of the zodiac are used in
almanacs they do not mean the constellations of the same name at all,
but the spaces or parts of the great circle which form the zodiac.
Two thousand years ago the constellations and the signs of the same
name were in the same spaces or parts of the zodiac, but the signs, by
precession, have shifted over one space to the west since that time,
while the constellations have of course remained unchanged, and this
has made a good deal of confusion.
It’s a pretty skillet of fish, this mixing of the signs and
constellations of the zodiac, but you will get used to it just as
easily as you get used to carrying water when in camp or washing
dishes.
=How to Read the Almanac.=--If you were asked to find the date of any
day of any month of the year you would simply look at a calendar and
find it in a jiffy.
Now, long before calendars came into general use the almanac was
freely consulted, not only for learning days and dates, but for much
more useful information, such as finding the dates of eclipses, the
beginning of seasons, the rising and setting of the Sun, Moon and
planets and the _conjunctions_ and _oppositions_ of these bodies,
planting potatoes and the year the father of your country was born.
To read an almanac easily you should learn the following signs:
☉ The Sun ☿ Mercury
○ Full Moon ♀ Venus
☾ Last Quarter ♁ The Earth
● New Moon ♂ Mars
☽ First Quarter
♃ Jupiter ☌ Conjunction
♄ Saturn ☍ Opposition
♅ Uranus
♆ Neptune
_Conjunction._--When this sign is used it means that two planets, or
the Sun and a planet, or the Moon and a planet, are on the _same_ side
of the Earth.
_Opposition._--When this sign is used it means that two planets, or the
Sun and a planet, or the Moon and a planet, are on opposite sides of
the Earth.
To see how these signs work out suppose you look up the month of
January, 1915, in an almanac.
The first line, besides showing that it is the first day of the year,
the first day of the month and that it is Friday, also shows that the ○
(Moon) is full. It further gives the time the ☉ (Sun) rises and sets,
the length of the days in hours and minutes, the ○ (Moon’s) age in
days, and when it rises and sets.
Then on the same line the following signs are given: ♂ ☿ ☌ and this
means that a conjunction of Mercury and Mars will take place on this
date; that is, that they will be nearer to each other from our line of
sight than at any other time for a long while.
On the next line, which is the 2nd of January, the following signs are
given: ♀ _greatest brilliancy_; ♁ _in perihelion_ ☌ ♆ ☾; the first of
which means that Venus has reached its greatest brightness; the second,
that the Earth is the nearest to the Sun that it will get, and the
third, that there is a conjunction of Neptune and the Moon; and so on
for every day of the year.
_Note_: A good almanac for daily star information is the _Old Farmers’
Almanac_, a copy of which you can get by sending 11 cents to William
Ware and Company, Boston, Mass.