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Star maps show Aquarius as a young man
pouring water from a jar or amphora, although Ovid, in his Fasti, says the liquid
is a mixture of water and nectar, the drink of the gods. The
water jar is marked by a Y-shaped asterism of four stars
centred on Zeta Aquarii, and the stream ends in the mouth of
the Southern Fish, Piscis Austrinus. But who is this young man
commemorated as Aquarius? The most popular identification is
that he is Ganymede or Ganymedes, said to have been the most
beautiful boy alive. He was the son of King Tros, who gave Troy
its name. One day, while Ganymede was watching over his
father’s sheep, Zeus became infatuated with the shepherd
boy and swooped down on the Trojan plain in the form of an
eagle, carrying Ganymede up to Olympus (or, according to an
alternative version, sent an eagle to do it for him). The eagle
is commemorated in the neighbouring constellation of Aquila.
In another version of the myth, Ganymede
was first carried off by Eos, goddess of the dawn, who had a
passion for young men, and Zeus then stole Ganymede from her.
Ganymede became wine-waiter to the gods, dispensing nectar from
his bowl, to the annoyance of Zeus’s wife Hera. Robert
Graves tells us that this myth became highly popular in ancient
Greece and Rome where it was regarded as signifying divine
endorsement for homosexuality. The Latin translation of the
name Ganymede gave rise to the word catamite.
Aquarius and his water jar, from the Atlas Coelestis of John Flamsteed.
If this myth seems insubstantial to us, it
is perhaps a result of the Greeks imposing their own story on a
constellation adopted from elsewhere. The constellation of the
water pourer originally seems to have represented the Egyptian
god of the Nile – but, as Robert Graves notes, the Greeks
were not much interested in the Nile.
Germanicus Caesar identifies the
constellation with Deucalion, son of Prometheus, one of the few
men to escape the great flood. ‘Deucalion pours forth
water, that hostile element he once fled, and in so doing draws
attention to his small pitcher’, wrote Germanicus.
Hyginus offers the additional identification of the
constellation with Cecrops, an early king of Athens, seen
making sacrifices to the gods using water, for he ruled in the
days before wine was made.
Several stars in Aquarius have names
beginning with ‘Sad’. In Arabic, sa’d means
‘luck’. Alpha Aquarii is called Sadalmelik, from sa’d al-malik,
usually translated as ‘the lucky stars of the
king’. Beta Aquarii is called Sadalsuud, from sa’d al-su’ud, possibly meaning ‘luckiest of the lucky’.
Gamma Aquarii is Sadachbia, from sa’d
al-akhbiya, possibly meaning
‘lucky stars of the tents’. The exact significance
of these names has been lost even by the Arabs, according to
the German expert on star names, Paul Kunitzsch. In the Almagest, Ptolemy
described Alpha, Beta and Gamma Aquarii as lying in the right
shoulder, left shoulder, and the right forearm of Aquarius
respectively. Ptolemy also listed the star we know as Fomalhaut
in Piscis Austrinus, the southern fish, as marking the end of
the flow of water from the jar; this is another example of
stars being shared between constellations in the days before
rigorous boundaries were established. Fomalhaut is now the
exclusive property of the southern fish.
In Chinese astronomy, the Water Jar
asterism in the north of Aquarius was known as Fenmu, a burial place
or tomb. Next to Fenmu, the present-day Alpha Aquarii was joined to
Theta and Epsilon Pegasi to form Wei, the roof of a house. There are three Chinese
constellations whose names are Romanized as Wei, but all of them have
different meanings. This Wei is the one after which the 12th lunar mansion is
named. Beta Aquarii and Alpha Equulei formed Xu, a place of emptiness and
darkness connected with winter and burials. To the south of Fenmu, a line of four
stars including Kappa Aquarii formed Xuliang, representing a
mausoleum, apparently for departed Emperors.
Starting in southern Pisces and crossing
Aquarius into Capricornus was the Chinese constellation Leibizhen, a line of
stars including Phi, Lambda, Sigma and Iota Aquarii that
represented a chain of fortifications to protect the army camp
or barracks to the south. The army itself was Yulinjun, the Imperial
(or Royal) Guards, a sprawling group of 45 stars, most of them
in Aquarius but a handful in Piscis Austrinus. Near the border
with Aquila was Nü, four stars including Epsilon Aquarii,
representing a maidservant. The 10th Chinese lunar mansion was
named Nü after this group. Overlapping the border with
Capricornus was Tianleicheng, a group of 13 stars including Xi and Nu
Aquarii, representing a castle with earthwork ramparts.
© Ian Ridpath. All rights reserved
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