Aries the Ram is certainly not the smallest constellation in the Butler night sky, although it sure appears to be.

Constellations are more than dot-to-dot pictures of animals, people, or things. They actually make a patchwork quilt across the night sky with parallel and perpendicular boundaries.

The entire sky is divided up into 88 constellations. They aren't all the same size though. Aries ranks near the middle in size. Even though Aries isn't the largest and flashiest constellation it's always been one of my favorites, and it possibly has some biblical implications to boot.

Currently, Aries the Ram resides in the early evening, high southern sky, almost overhead. There's not that much to it, just two medium bright stars and a dimmer one that arguably outlines the horn of a ram. You can't miss it because it's very distinct.

Aries is one of the smaller constellations of the Zodiac, made up of thirteen constellations that stretch in a band all across the night sky. The Zodiac band runs about 8 degrees on either side of the sun's apparent path among the stars as Earth orbits the sun. Since all of the major planets in our solar system circle the sun in nearly the same mathematical plane, give or take a few degrees, the planets are always found somewhere in the zodiac band at any one time or another.

Where any given planet is along the zodiac band depends on where they are in their orbit around the sun and where the Earth is in our solar circuit. For example, the very bright planet Venus in the low southwest sky is shining in the constellation Aquarius the water bearer, while Mars, just to the upper left of Venus, resides in Pisces the fish.

The constellation Aries and the bright planet Jupiter are major players in one of the theories about the “Star of Bethlehem.” Jupiter may have been the Christmas star shining in the constellation Aries the Ram around the time Christ was born. There's even a Roman coin that depicts this event.

The two brighter stars of Aries are Hamel on the upper left, and Sheratan on the lower right. The dimmer star just below Sheratan is Mesarthim.

Hamel is a giant star in our Milky Way galaxy, more than 850 trillion miles or 66 light-years away from Earth. It's so far away that the light you see from Hamel today left that star back in 1951, when a gallon of gas cost just 20 cents. Hamel is about 15 times the diameter of our own sun and almost 100 times as luminous.

The Greek mythological story of Aries the Ram is another epic. Zeus, the king of the gods, had a pet ram with a coat made of gold fleece that he named Aries. The golden ram also sported wings so he could soar high in the skies above Mount Olympus.

Zeus wasn't exactly a true family man. He had many girlfriends, and many a rendezvous in a lush valley at the foot of Mount Olympus with his special friends. He would bring Aries with him.

During one of those rendezvous on a beautiful sunny day there was much love in the air. The mood was broken up when suddenly Zeus heard Apollo, the god of the sun, shouting at him from his airborne chariot high in the sky.

Zeus climbed up on the back of Aries and shot up by Apollo's side. The sun deity told Zeus of the plight of two small children that were about to be eaten by a lion 10 miles away.

The kids had drifted away from their mother at a marketplace and wandered into some nearby high grass. Little did they know they were about to become a lion's lunch. Zeus was in a good mood that day and knew that his Aries liked to help kids, so he promptly dispatched his pet ram off on a rescue mission.

The lion was within 20 feet of bagging the kids when Aries swooped from the sky like a cruise missile. He scooped up the children on his back and flew them off to safety. Aries then winged his way back to the local marketplace with the kids saddled up on his back to reunite them with their greatly relieved mother.

For the rest of his life Aries set out on missions of mercy and rescue. When Aries died, Zeus rewarded him for his bravery and placed his body into the heavens to become the constellation we see today. The little ram became one of the big time heroes of his time.

Celestial hugging this week:

Venus and Mars are getting closer and closer to each other in the very early evening southwestern sky.

By around midweek they'll be separated by just seven degrees, or less that the width of your fist held at arm's length.

Venus is by far the brighter of the two on the lower right. There isn't all that much to see on either planet with even a larger telescope because Mars is so far away and Venus is completely cloud covered. What's cool about Venus, however, is that it's crescent shaped, just like a crescent moon.

Correction for solar eclipse column

Last week in my column I discussed the wonderful solar eclipse that will take place on Aug. 21.

In Butler, it'll be a very deep partial eclipse. It will be a total eclipse, though, along a narrow strip from coast to coast across the 48 states. I told you that during a partial eclipse you'll need special eclipse glasses to safely watch the moon creep across the sun's face. You never want to stare at the partially eclipsed sun without them. You can really damage your eyes, or worse.

My mistake was that I also told you that if you're in the path of the total eclipse you could take your glasses off a few seconds before totality sets in.

To be perfectly safe, though, you should keep your glasses on until totality begins. While the risk of hurting is eyes is lower for just a quick glance or two at that point, you're much better off keeping the glasses on. Safety first!