Everything about Orion Constellation totally explained
Orion, a
constellation often referred to as
The Hunter, is a prominent constellation, one of the largest and perhaps the best-known and most conspicuous in the sky. Its brilliant stars are found on the
celestial equator and are visible throughout the world. Its three prominent "belt" stars - three stars of medium brightness in the mid-section of this constellation - make this constellation easy to spot and globally recognized. From mid-northern latitudes, Orion is visible in the evening from October to early January and in the morning from late July to November.
According to the most common contemporary imagery:
Orion is standing next to the
river Eridanus with his two
hunting dogs Canis Major and
Canis Minor, fighting
Taurus the bull. Other prey of his, such as
Lepus the hare, can be found nearby.
There are other contemporary names for Orion. In
Australia, the belt and sword of Orion are sometimes called the
Saucepan, because the stars of Orion's belt and sword resemble this kitchen utensil as seen from the
Southern Hemisphere. Orion's Belt is called
Drie Konings (Three Kings) by Afrikaans speakers in South Africa, and French
les Trois Rois (the Three Kings) in
Daudet's
Lettres de Mon Moulin (1866). The appellation
Driekoningen (the Three Kings) is also often found in 17th- and 18th-century Dutch star charts and seaman's guides.
Historically it has had other names, perhaps the earliest known is the
Babylonian "Shepherd of
Anu", corresponding to an apparent representation of the constellation
Auriga or an element of it, as a
shepherd's crook. JDH3 is a nickname for a scientist and he claims that Orion was a warior or king in Troy.
Stars in the Constellation
The constellation is extremely rich in bright
stars and in
deep-sky objects. Here are some of its stars.
- λ Ori (Meissa) is Orion's head.
- α Ori (Betelgeuse), at its right shoulder, is a red star with a diameter larger than the orbit of Mars. Although it's the α-star, it's somewhat fainter than Rigel.
- γ Ori (Bellatrix), is at Orion's left shoulder.
- ζ Ori (Alnitak), ε Ori (Alnilam) and δ Ori (Mintaka) make up the asterism known as Orion's Belt: three bright stars in a row; from these alone one can recognize Orion.
- η Ori (Eta Orionis), between Delta Orionis and Rigel.
- κ Ori (Saiph) is at Orion's right knee.
- β Ori (Rigel), at the constellation's left knee, is a large blue-white star, among the brightest in the sky. It has three companions, invisible to the naked eye.
- ι Ori (Hatsya) is at the tip of Orion's sword.
Locating other stars
Orion is very useful in locating other stars. By extending the line of the Belt southeastward,
Sirius (α CMa) can be found; northwestward,
Aldebaran (α Tau). A line eastward across the two shoulders indicates the direction of
Procyon (α CMi). A line from Rigel through Betelgeuse points to
Castor and
Pollux (α Gem and β Gem). Additionally, Rigel is part of the
Winter Circle. Sirius and Procyon, which may be located from Orion by tracing lines, also are points in both the
Winter Triangle and the Circle.
See also the
list of stars in Orion.
Notable deep sky objects
Hanging from Orion's belt is his sword, consisting of the multiple stars θ1 and θ2 Orionis, called
Trapezium and the
Orion Nebula (M42). This is a spectacular object which can be clearly identified with the naked eye as something other than a star; using binoculars, its swirling clouds of nascent stars, luminous gas, and dust can be observed.
Another famous
nebula is
IC 434, the
Horsehead Nebula, near ζ Orionis. It contains a dark dust cloud whose shape gives the nebula its name.
Besides these nebulae, surveying Orion with a small
telescope will reveal a wealth of interesting deep sky objects, including
M43,
M78, as well as multiple stars including
Iota Orionis and
Sigma Orionis. A larger telescope may reveal objects such as
Barnard's Loop, the
Flame Nebula (NGC 2024), as well as fainter and tighter multiple stars and nebulae.
All of these nebulae are part of the larger
Orion Molecular Cloud Complex which is located approximately 1,500 light-years away and is hundreds of light-years across. It is one of the most intense regions of stellar formation visible in our galaxy.
Orion in Islamic astronomy
Alnitak
ζ Ori is a star in the constellation Orion. It is the lowest of the prominent three stars
[Othertwo:ε Ori (Alnilam), δ Ori (Mintaka)], which form a straight line, commonly known as the Orion Belt. The names
Alnitak,
Mintaka and
Alnilam originate from
Arabic.
History
The configurations of the constellation Orion roughly formed about 1.5 million years ago, because of relative slow movements of stars within the constellation from earth's perspective (especially the belt of Orion). Orion will remain visible in the night sky for the next 1 to 2 million years, making it one of the longest observable constellations, parallel to the rise of human civilization.
Being so bright and distinctive, the pattern of stars that forms Orion was recognized as a coherent constellation by many ancient civilizations, though with different representations and mythologies.
The ancient
Sumerians saw this star pattern as forming part of an image of a shepherd (sometimes in a chariot) with his sheep and in some versions a shepherd's crook, while in
China, Orion was one of the
28 lunar mansions Sieu (Xiu) （宿）. Known as
Shen （參）, literally meaning "three", it's believed to be named so for the three stars located in Orion's belt. (See
Chinese constellation)
The stars were associated with
Osiris, the god of death and underworld, by the
ancient Egyptians. The
Giza pyramid complex, which consists of the
Great Pyramid of Giza, the
Pyramid of Khafre and the
Pyramid of Menkaure, is said to be a sky-map of the Belt of Orion, that is, of Osiris. In
archeoastronomy,
Graham Hancock and
Robert Bauvel describe this arrangement as central to the
Orion Correlation Theory or OCT.
References in ancient Middle Eastern and Mediterranean literature to the "belt and sword" imagery of Orion are those most often echoed in modern western literature and for this reason this imagery has found its way into popular western culture, for example in the form of the shoulder
insignia of the
27th Infantry Division of the
United States Army during both World Wars, probably owing to a pun on the name of the division's first commander, Major General
John F. O'Ryan.
Around
October 21 each year the famous
Orionid meteor shower reaches its peak. Coming from the border to the constellation Gemini as much as 20 meteors per hour can be seen.
Mythology
Greek mythology has several versions of the history of
Orion, the gigantic hunter of primordial times. These end in different versions of his death: He challenged the gods, by claiming that he could kill every wild animal on Earth. Some versions then say Artemis shot him with her arrows; but others say that Artemis or Earth produced a great Scorpion whom he couldn't defeat and which killed him. The gods raised him and the Scorpion to the skies, as
Scorpio/
Scorpius. Yet other stories say Orion was chasing the
Pleiades.
The nearby constellations of
Canis Major and
Canis Minor are visualized in some myths as Orion's hunting dogs.
It may be that the naming of the constellation precedes the mythology in this case. It has been suggested that Orion is named from the
Akkadian
Uru-anna, the light of heaven, the name then passing into Greek mythology. As such, the myth surrounding Orion may derive simply from the relative positions of the constellations around it in the sky. In some depictions, Orion appears to be composed of three bodies, having three arms
(External Link
), two divergent legs, and a small central one, as well as the three bodies being bound at the waist. As such, together with other features of the area in the
Zodiac sign of
Gemini (for example the
Milky Way, the deserted area now considered as the constellations
Camelopardalis and
Lynx, and the constellations
Gemini,
Auriga, and
Canis Major), this may be the origin of the myth of the cattle of
Geryon, which forms one of
The Twelve Labours of
Heracles.
In pre-Christian
Scandinavia, the "Orion's belt" portion of the constellation was known as
Frigg's
Distaff (
Friggerock) or
Freyja's distaff.
In
Finnish mythology the constellation of Orion is called the scythe of
Väinämöinen. The term most likely comes from the fact it can be seen in the sky in early autumn in the Northern Hemisphere, the time of haymaking.
In ancient
Aram, the constellation was known as
Nephila, Orion's
descendants were known as
Nephilim.
The constellation is mentioned in
Horace's
Odes,
Homer's
Odyssey and
Iliad, and
Virgil's
Aeneid.
In other cultures
The
Bible mentions Orion three times:
Job 9:9 ("He is the maker of the Bear and Orion"),
Job 38:31 ("Can you loosen Orion`s belt?"), and
Amos 5:8. ("He who made the Pleiades and Orion")
The
Chinese character 參 (
pinyin shēn) originally meant the constellation Orion ; its
Shang dynasty version, over three millennia old, contains at the top a representation of the three stars of Orion's belt atop a man's head (the bottom portion representing the sound of the word was added later).
The
Seri people of northwestern Mexico call the three stars in the belt of this constellation
Hapj (a name denoting a hunter) which consists of three stars:
Hap (mule deer),
Haamoja (pronghorn), and
Mojet (bighorn sheep).
Hap is in the middle and has been shot by the hunter; its blood has dripped onto
Tiburón Island.
Orion is also important in
Australian Aboriginal Astronomy. For example, the
Yolngu people of
Arnhem Land say that the constellation of Orion, which they call Julpan, is a canoe. They tell the story of two brothers who went fishing, and caught and ate a fish that was forbidden under their law. Seeing this, the
Sun sent a waterspout that carried the two brothers and their canoe up into the sky where they became the Orion constellation.
In
Indian Mythology, the constellation is known as '
Vyadh', which also means "The Hunter".
Citations
Further Information
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