Cassiopeia was the vain and boastful wife
of King Cepheus of Ethiopia, who lies next to her in the sky.
They are the only husband-and-wife couple among the
constellations. Classical authors spell her name Cassiepeia,
but Cassiopeia is the form used by astronomers.
While combing her long locks one day,
Cassiopeia dared to claim that she was more beautiful than the
sea nymphs called the Nereids. There were 50 Nereids, daughters
of Nereus, the so-called Old Man of the Sea. One of the
Nereids, Amphitrite, was married to Poseidon, the sea god. The
Nereids appealed to Poseidon to punish Cassiopeia for her
vanity, and the sea god sent a monster to ravage the coast of
King Cepheus’s country. This monster is commemorated in
the constellation Cetus. To appease the monster, Cepheus and
Cassiopeia chained their daughter Andromeda to a rock as a
sacrifice, but Andromeda was saved from the monster’s
jaws by the hero Perseus in one of the most famous rescue
stories in history.
As an added punishment, Cassiopeia was
condemned to circle the celestial pole for ever, sometimes
hanging upside down in undignified posture. In the sky
Cassiopeia is depicted sitting on her throne, still fussing
with her hair.
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Cassiopeia, the vain queen seated on her throne, depicted in the
Atlas Coelestis of John Flamsteed (1729).
The constellation of Cassiopeia has a
distinctive W-shape made up of its five brightest stars, which
writers such as Aratus likened to a key or a folding door.
Alpha Cassiopeiae is called Shedir or Schedar, from the Arabic al-sadr meaning
‘the breast’, which position it marks. Beta
Cassiopeiae is known as Caph from the Arabic meaning
‘stained hand’, as the stars of Cassiopeia were
thought by them to represent a hand stained with henna. Delta
Cassiopeiae is named Ruchbah, from the Arabic for
‘knee’, rukbat. The central star of the W, Gamma Cassiopeiae,
is an erratic variable star, given to occasional outbursts in
brightness.
© Ian Ridpath. All rights reserved
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