Enter the Dragon

The Big Dipper is always in the sky. So is the Little Dipper. Together, they show us the way to the constellation of Draco, the dragon.

The end stars of the bowl are called the "pointer stars;" they point us to the pole star, Polaris. Polaris is the tip of the handle of the Little Dipper, and, though the stars are not nearly as bright as those of the Big Dipper, here in Vermont I've never had any trouble seeing it.

Now we repeat what we just did: the two bright stars at the end of the bowl of the Little Dipper are pointers, too: they point eastward to the eyes of Draco, stars almost equally bright about two thirds of the way to brilliant Vega. The rest of Draco twists like a snake: first to the north, then back, and finally to lie between the dippers.

In ancient times, when constellations were first named, the pole star, the star around which the heavens rotated was not our North Star, Polaris, but Thuban in Draco. The dragon was the center around which the heavens rotated. To the Sumerians Draco was the symbol of primordial chaos. To the Greeks, he was the guardian of the Golden Apples -- the stars. And to others -- the serpent of Eden.

The left eye, Rastaban, is a yellow star, about as hot as the Sun, but a giant six hundred times brighter. Its light has been dimmed by six hundred years of travel: more than three thousand trillion miles.

The right eye, Elanin, is a star much cooler than the Sun: it appears orange through binoculars; the keen-eyed may even see its color with the naked eye. This star was very near the north pole in ancient times: in Egypt it was worshipped as the goddess Isis for millennia before Sirius took on that role. Many temples in ancient Egypt are aligned with this star. The dragon has always dominated the thoughts of men and women.

(04/30/08)