Knight of the Brazen Serpent | Chapter 25 Part 1

The Pleiades were so named from a Greek word signifying to sail. In all ages they have been observed for signs and seasons. Virgil says that the sailors gave names to “the Pleiades, Hyades, and the Northern Car: Pleiadas, Hyadas, Claramque Lycaonis Arcton.” And Palinurus, he says,

 

studied Arcturus and the rainy Hyades and the Twin Triones, and Orion cinctured with gold.

Taurus was the prince and leader of the celestial host for more than two thousand years; and when his head set with the Sun about the last of May, the Scorpion was seen to rise in the South-east.

The Pleiades were sometimes called Vergiliæ, or the Virgins of Spring; because the Sun entered this cluster of stars in the season of blossoms. Their Syrian name was Succoth, or Succothbeneth, derived from a Chaldæan word signifying to speculate or observe.

The Hyades are five stars in the form of a V, 11° southeast of

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the Pleiades. The Greeks counted them as seven. When the Vernal Equinox was in Taurus, Aldebarán led up the starry host; and as he rose in the East, Aries was about 27° high.

When he was close upon the meridian, the Heavens presented their most magnificent appearance. Capella was a little further from the meridian, to the north; and Orion still further from it to the southward. Procyon, Sirius, Castor and Pollux had climbed about halfway from the horizon to the meridian. Regulus had just risen upon the ecliptic. The Virgin still lingered below the horizon. Fomalhaut was halfway to the meridian in the Southwest; and to the Northwest were the brilliant constellations, Perseus, Cepheus, Cassiopeia, and Andromeda; while the Pleiades had just passed the meridian.

ORION is visible to all the habitable world. The equinoctial line passes through the centre of it. When Aldebarán rose in the East, the Three Kings in Orion followed him; and as Taurus set, the Scorpion, by whose sting it was said Orion died, rose in the East.

Orion rises at noon about the 9th of March. His rising was accompanied with great rains and storms, and it became very terrible to mariners.

In Boötes, called by the ancient Greeks Lycaon, from lukos, a wolf, and by the Hebrews, Caleb Anubach, the Barking Dog, is the Great Star ARCTURUS, which, when Taurus opened the year, corresponded with a season remarkable for its great heat.

Next comes GEMINI, the Twins, two human figures, in the heads of which are the bright Stars CASTOR and POLLUX, the Dioscuri, and the Cabiri of Samothrace, patrons of navigation; while South of Pollux are the brilliant Stars SIRIUS and PROCYON, the greater and lesser Dog: and still further South, Canopus, in the Ship Argo.

Sirius is apparently the largest and brightest Star in the Heavens. When the Vernal Equinox was in Taurus, he rose heliacally, that is, just before the Sun, when, at the Summer Solstice, the Sun entered Leo, about the 21st of June, fifteen days previous to the swelling of the Nile. The heliacal rising of Canopus was also a precursor of the rising of the Nile. Procyon was the forerunner of Sirius, and rose before him.

There are no important Stars in CANCER. In the Zodiacs of Esne and Dendera, and in most of the astrological remains of

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[paragraph continues] Egypt, the sign of this constellation was a beetle (Scarabæus), which thence became sacred, as an emblem of the gate through which souls descended from Heaven. In the crest of Cancer is a cluster of Stars formerly called Præsepe, the Manger, on each side of which is a small Star, the two of which were called Aselli little asses.

In Leo are the splendid Stars, REGULUS, directly on the ecliptic, and DENEBOLA in the Lion’s tail. Southeast of Regulus is the fine Star COR HYDRÆ.

The combat of Hercules with the Nemæan lion was his first labor. It was the first sign into which the Sun passed, after falling below the Summer Solstice; from which time he struggled to re-ascend.

The Nile overflowed in this sign. It stands first in the Zodiac of Dendera, and is in all the Indian and Egyptian Zodiacs.