Cancer, the Crab, is the next sign of the Zodiac. In the Greek mythology it was supposed to have been placed in the sky by Juno to commemorate the crab which pinched the toes of Hercules in the Lernæan marsh. The Greek name was τυβί. According to Dupuis it represents the 12th “labour of Hercules”—his capture of the golden apples in the Garden of the Hesperides, which were guarded by a Dragon. This Dragon is Draco, which was also called Custos Hesperidum.[411] But the connection between a crab and the myth of the golden apples is not obvious—unless some reference to “crab apples” is intended! Among the Romans, Cancer was consecrated to Mercury, and by the ancient Egyptians to their god Anubis.
The well-known cluster in Cancer called the Præsape, Al-Sufi says, is “a little spot which resembles a cloud, and is surrounded by four stars, two to the west [η and θ Cancri] and two to the east” [γ and δ]. This cluster is mentioned by Aratus, who calls it the “Manger.” The word Præsape is often translated “Beehive,” but there can be no doubt that it really means “Manger,” referring to the stars γ and δ Cancri, which the ancients called Aselli, the ass’s colts. These were supposed to represent the asses which in the war of Jupiter against the Giants helped his victory by their braying!
Admiral Smyth says in his Bedford Catalogue (p. 202) that he found γ and δ Cancri both of 4th magnitude; but the photometric measures show that δ is now distinctly brighter than γ. An occultation of δ Cancri by the moon is recorded as having occurred on September 3, B.C. 240.
The fine constellation Leo, the Lion, is the next “sign” of the Zodiac, and is marked by the well-known “Sickle.” According to Dupuis, it represents the first “labour of Hercules”—the killing of the Nemælian lion. Manilius called it Nemæus. It was also called Janonus sidus, Bacchi sidus, etc. The Greek name was μεχίρ, μεχείρ, or μεχός. In ancient Egypt, Leo was sacred to Osiris, and many of the Egyptian monuments are ornamented with lions’ heads. It is stated in the Horapolla that its appearance was supposed to announce the annual rising of the Nile.
Regulus (α Leonis) is the brightest and most southern of the stars in the “Sickle.” Al-Sufi says “it is situated in the heart and is of the 1st magnitude. It is that which is called al-maliki, the royal star. It is marked on the astrolabe as kalb al-asad, the Heart of the Lion” (whence the name Cor Leonis). Modern photometric measures make it about 1·3 magnitude. It has an 8½ magnitude companion at about 177″ distance (Burnham) which is moving through space with the bright star, and is therefore at probably the same distance from the earth as its brilliant primary. This companion is double (8·5, 12·5: 3″·05, Burnham). The spectroscope shows that Regulus is approaching the earth at the rate of 5½ miles a second. Its parallax is very small—about 0″·022, according to Dr. Elkin—which indicates that it is at a vast distance from the earth; and its brightness shows that it must be a sun of enormous size. Ptolemy called it βασιλίσκος, whence its Latin name Regulus, first used by Copernicus as the diminutive of rex.[412]
The next constellation of the Zodiac is Virgo, the Virgin. It was also called by the ancients Ceres, Isis, Erigone, Fortuna, Concorda, Astræa, and Themis. The Greek name was φαμένωθ. Ceres was the goddess of the harvest. Brown thinks that it probably represents the ancient goddess Istar, and also Ashtoreth. According to Prof. Sayce it is the same as the Accadian sign of “the errand of Istar, a name due to the belief that it was in August that the goddess Astarte descended into Hades in search of her betrothed, the sun god Tammuz, or Adonis, who had been slain by the boar’s tusk.”[413] The ear of corn (Spica) is found on the ancient Egyptian monuments, and is supposed to represent the fertility caused by the annual rising of the Nile. According to Aratus, the Virgin lived on earth during the golden age under the name of Justice, but that in the bronze age she left the earth and took up her abode in the heavens.
“Justice, loathing that race of men,
Winged her flight to heaven.”
The Sphinx near the Great Pyramid has the head of a virgin on the body of a lion, representing the goddess Isis (Virgo) and her husband Osiris (Leo).
Al-Sufi’s 5th star of Virgo is Flamsteed 63 Virginis. Al-Sufi says it is a double star of the 5th magnitude. In Al-Sufi’s time it formed a “naked-eye double” with 61 Virginis, but owing to large proper motion, 61 has now moved about 26 minutes of arc towards the south, and no longer forms a double with 63. This interesting fact was first pointed out by Flammarion in his work Les Étoiles (p. 373).
Libra, the Balance, is one of the “signs” of the Zodiac, but originally formed the claws of the Scorpion. It was called Juguna by Cicero, and Mochos by Ampelius. The Greek name was φαρμουθέ. Virgil suggests that it represented the justice of the emperor Augustus, honoured by the name of a constellation; but probably this refers to the birth of Augustus under the sign of Libra, as Scaliger has pointed out. According to Brown, “the daily seizing of the dying western sun by the claws of the Scorpion of darkness is reduplicated annually at the Autumnal Equinox, when the feeble waning sun of shortening days falls ever earlier into his enemy’s grasp;”[414] and he says, “The Balance or Scales (Libra), which it will be observed is in itself neither diurnal nor nocturnal, is the only one of the zodiacal signs not Euphratean in origin, having been imported from Egypt and representing originally the balance of the sun at the horizon between the upper and under worlds; and secondarily the equality of the days and nights at the equinox.”[415]