Many of the constellations have epic tales of heroism with a lot of romance mixed in, both in good and bad ways.
One of the best is the saga of Perseus the Hero, a constellation perched fairly high in the Pottsville eastern sky these early November evenings. Perseus is not one of the brightest constellations in the heavens, but it’s still fairly easy to spot. It kind of looks like a stickman. He has two arms, one of them clutching the severed head of Medusa, and that’s where our story begins.
Perseus was one of the many children of Zeus, the king of the gods. One day, Zeus dispatched Perseus to the countryside to rip off the head of Medusa, a huge public health hazard of a monster. Just a glance at Medusa magically turned you to stone. All around the land nice folks were being turned into unwilling statues. Perseus had to succeed ... failure was not an option!
Armed with the winged shoes of Mercury, the messenger of the gods, and the magic shield of Athena, the goddess of wisdom, Perseus was able to locate Medusa without actually looking directly at the monster. Medusa was so ugly that instead of hair, snakes were growing out of its head. Using some fancy maneuvers, Perseus dove down and with all his might grabbed a handful of snakes and ripped the head off of the monster. He quickly stuffed Medusa’s lopped off head into one of those environmentally unfriendly extra large plastic leaf bags for the trip back home to Mount Olympus.
A funny thing happened on the way back to Olympus though. As Perseus flew over the sea, defective holes in the plastic bag allowed drops of blood to escape from the snake-headed monster and fall into the sea.
Don’t ask me how, but when the drops hit the water there was a puff of watery smoke and magically a flying horse emerged and flew up to Perseus’s side and flew in formation with him. As the fellow flyers continued on, Perseus quickly realized that this winged horse had some smarts. On command he rolled over and flew upside down, fetched a seagull with his front hoofs and performed other tricks. Perseus named his new pet Pegasus after a German shepherd he had when he was a kid.
As Perseus and Pegasus flew on over the sea, they came across a perilous scene. A young woman was chained to a rock on the shore, and a big ugly green sea monster was charging at her. It was very apparent to Perseus that the sea beast was not planning to help the young lady build a sandcastle on the beach. She was going to be his lunch. How the maiden got in that bad spot is actually a whole other story involving Cepheus and Cassiopeia, the king and queen of ancient Ethiopia. I won’t go into that now, except to say that they were forced to sacrifice their daughter, Princess Andromeda, to this big ugly green sea monster to protect the kingdom from being destroyed. How awful is that?
Anyway Perseus had to act and act quickly. As the monster was closing in, Perseus and Pegasus charged out of the sky on a rescue mission. Perseus knew that there was no way he could physically take on the beast himself. So instead, using Athena’s shield to protect his eyes he pulled out the head of Medusa and shook it right in the sea monster’s face, and sure enough, the sea beast got stoned and sunk rapidly like a boat anchor into the deep blue waters.
Then, without even being commanded, Pegasus flew down to Andromeda’s side and chewed through the chain, freeing the Princess. Pegasus had one tough set of choppers! Andromeda hopped on Pegasus’s back and flew up to Perseus. That’s when some real magic happened. When their eyes met it was big time love. As soon as Andromeda and Perseus, along with their faithful horse Pegasus, arrived home from their mission, wedding bells clanged.
They almost went on to live happily ever after, but one night when Perseus was in a bar with his buddies he got into an argument with a guy from a neighboring town. Tough words morphed into a fist fight and soon the swords came out. Perseus, with a few too many beers in him, wasn’t all that sharp. A sword was thrust into his chest, and as he lay mortally wounded below the dartboard he called out Andromeda’s name over and over until he breathed his last.
To honor Perseus, all of the management-type gods on Mount Olympus magically turned his body into the constellation we see in the eastern early evening sky this time of year. By the way, there are also constellations nearby that honor Pegasus and Andromeda. It’s only right that they are all together in the eastern sky this time of year.
Right about where the head of Medusa is located in the constellation is a star called Algol, also known as “the demon star.” Astronomically, Algol is an eclipsing binary star, a pair of stars that orbit each other in a three-day cycle. As the stars rapidly circle each other they eclipse each other. It looks like the demon star is sinisterly blinking at you ... a reminder of the menacing Medusa.
An absolute must-see in the constellation Perseus is the great Perseus Double Cluster, just above the hero’s head and not all that far away from neighboring Cassiopeia.
If you’re lucky enough to be stargazing in the countryside you can see it with the naked eye as a misty patch among the stars. It’s a wonderful target with a pair of binoculars or a small telescope. I know you’ll love it! It’s a pair of huge open star clusters made up of about 100 young stars each that were born anywhere from 3 to 6 million years ago. Believe it or not, that makes them stellar children. Both clusters are really out there at a distance of 7,000 light years away, with just one light year equaling about 6 trillion miles!
Next week, I’ll tell you about the largest and closest full moon since 1976. It’ll be the kingpin of “super moons.”
Celestial hugging
this weekend
This weekend, the first quarter moon will pass by and above the bright planet Mars in the low southern sky. On Saturday night, the moon will be just to the upper right of Mars and on Sunday night the moon will be perched just above the red planet.
(Lynch, an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist, can be reached at mikewlynch@comcast.net)