This column was provided by San Benito resident and amateur astronomer David Baumgartner as part of a local series on astronomy. Lea este articulo en español aqui.
Some years ago I was a visitor at the San Jose Astronomy Club listening to a prominent local astronomer from the University of California at Berkeley; he was giving a lecture on constellations. He happened to mention the name of “Ophiuchus” a constellation next to Hercules, one I don’t recollect ever hearing before. So whenever things go over my head I have a tendency to make a joke about it so as not to feel left out. So he comes up with the name of Ophiuchus and I promptly blurt out, loud enough for everyone in the audience to hear including the speaker, “God Bless You” I said. Well of course I got a big laugh. But then he surprises everyone and immediately comes back at me with one of his own, “Did I get any on you and do you happen to have a tissue my boy?” Well needless to say he got a bigger laugh than I did and put me in my place. Needless to say, I didn’t open my mouth for the rest of the evening, which was quite hard for me to do. But I did manage.
While growing up on the corner of Hawkins and Washington streets here in Hollister our family didn’t have the privilege or the convenience of having a TV at the time and for sure not the internet. The what? All we had was the library, a magazine now and then, the encyclopedia salesman and the daily Free Lance reporting on the front page, stories such as “South County– Old Mrs. Carter fell and broke her hip last Monday”. Those were the good ole days. Maybe not for Mrs. Carter. When I did get my hands on an astronomy article I would come up with my own ways of pronouncing most of the Greek and Latin words for lack of having the proper guidance from anyone to show me how they should be pronounced. Words like Cassiopeia, (Cas’see’o’pe’a, not Caseopia) Sagittarius, Andromeda, Eridanus, and of course Ophiuchus. (O’ fee’ cus, Not Op’hee’u’chus) Remember I was still young and learning, …….Now with a wife and three children, ……nine grandchildren, ……and still quite slow at times.
It turns out Ophiuchus is a man who leads a pretty dangerous life. Here the man is standing with one foot on the head of a scorpion and his other foot on the scorpion’s stinger. In both hands he’s holding a large snake, which is the constellation Serpens. (Finally one I can pronounce properly) Serpens is the only constellation that comes in two separate parts. Perhaps Ophiuchus (whose name means in Greek “snake holder”) has torn the snake into two pieces.
You remember that the constellations that the ecliptic passes through are called the Zodiac. There are 12: Pisces, Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpius, Sagittarius, Capricornus, and Aquarius. But the ecliptic actually passes through the feet of Ophiuchus also. So as far as I’m concerned Ophiuchus should be counted as one of the zodiacal constellation. After all, the sun, moon, and planets spend more time in Ophiuchus than they do in Scorpius. So what month should this new found zodiac figure represent? I’ll have to give this some serious thought for a while and get back to you. In the meantime if you come up with a respectable answer, drop me a line. Okay, I’ve given it some thought; at one time there were only eleven Zodiac members. The gods wanted twelve, one for each month. They thought it over and decided to strip the claws away from neighboring Scorpius and make a new Zodiac member of them and call it Libra. Now in my mind they should have given Ophiuchus the twelfth Zodiac designation instead of tearing away the claws of Scorpius, which just happens to be my sign, evidently the gods didn’t give that any consideration when solving their dilemma. So instead of Librarians we would have Ophiuchusians. I think it has a nice ring to it, not that I know how to spell it, or anything.
So next time you are out at night give ole Ophi a look see, and look for the two piece snake, Serpens, not easy to find.
Clear skies
What’s up this Month:
Aug 01 First Quarter Moon
Aug 01 Moon is at apogee (251,134 miles from Earth)
Aug 03 Moon passes 0.6° south of Antares
Aug 06 Saturn passes 1.1° south of Neptune
Aug 08 Moon passes 0.0009° north of Pluto
Aug 09 Full Moon
Aug 12 Venus passes 0.9° south of Jupiter
Aug 12 Moon passes 4° north of Saturn
Aug 12 Moon passes 3° north of Neptune
Aug 12 Perseid meteor shower peaks
Aug 14 Moon is at perigee (229,465 miles from Earth)
Aug 16 Last Quarter Moon
Aug 16 Moon passes 5° north of Uranus
Aug 19 Moon passes 5° north of Jupiter
Aug 20 Moon passes 5° north of Venus
Aug 21 Venus passes 7° south of Pollux
Aug 21 Moon passes 4° north of Mercury
Aug 23 New Moon
Aug 26 Moon passes 3° south of Mars
Aug 27 Moon passes 1.2° south of Spica
Aug 29 Moon is at apogee (251,374 miles from Earth)
Aug 31 First Quarter Moon
Aug 31 Moon passes 0.7° south of ‘Antares