Lords paramount in heaven, that winter bring
And summer in their train for mortal men,
Right well I know them as they come and go”[482].
The discovery of star-observation and of its use in time-reckoning and navigation is ascribed to the heroes Prometheus and Palamedes. The latter is regarded by the tragic poets as the founder of all the elements of intellectual culture, and so also of the science of the stars[483]. And Prometheus, who glories in having brought to men every advance in civilisation, includes therein the knowledge of the risings and settings of the stars:—
“Of winter’s coming no sure sign had they,
Nor of the advent of the flowery spring,
Of fruitful summer none: so fared through each,
And took no thought, till that the hidden lore
Of rising stars and setting I unveiled”[484].
Later, the phases of the stars have become so familiar to everyone that Sophocles can say, ‘a time of six months from spring to Arcturus’, i. e. the morning rising of Arcturus on Sept. 18[485].