Without a doubt, one of the strangest constellations in the Butler winter heavens is Auriga, the chariot driver with goats on his shoulder.

I would have liked to have been at the party when they dreamed up that constellation. Libations must have been aplenty.

So what does a constellation named after chariot driver with goats on his shoulder have to do with Thanksgiving?

Actually not a whole heck of a lot except for the fact that this is the time of year we begin to see it in the early evening in the low eastern sky.

Auriga is part of my favorite group of constellations I call “Orion and his gang” that dominate the winter heavens. Auriga is one of the constellations that leads in the winter shiners. Auriga resembles a giant lopsided pentagon with the bright star Capella at one of the corners.

How can you make a lopsided pentagon into a chariot driver hauling a mama goat with her baby kid goats?

A mega imagination!

Now most constellations don’t really look like what they are supposed to be because they were more or less celestial props and visual tools to pass on stories and legends from generation to generation.

Way back then there weren’t many books, Kindles or YouTube. They were a few years off, so these poor excuses for pictures in the stars were used to pass on all the tales.

People would see a formation or group of stars that sort of matched the character of a particular story and then named that constellation after the character.

Different civilizations would have different characters and constellations. The Greeks named Auriga, but in this case I think they went to extremes.

According to one of the Greek legends, there once was a mighty king named Oenomaus who was the ruler of a mighty kingdom.

He had a beautiful daughter, Hippodameia, who had many suitors who wished to marry her.

King Oenemaus didn’t wish for his daughter to be married to any of them and in fact wanted them all killed.

Nice guy.

Now the king was an excellent chariot racer and arranged races with all the suitors.

The deal was this: The first suitor to beat him in a race would win the hand of his daughter, but if he lost the race he would be killed. Well, since Oenemaus had the fastest horses in the land, he routinely outraced the young lads and slayed them one by one.

There was only one suitor left, Pelops, son of Hermes, the messenger of the gods. When his turn came to race for the hand of Hippodameia, he got some help from the other gods. They provided a chariot that would sprout golden wings to guarantee victory.

Pelops didn’t stop there, though; he paid off Oenmaus’ chariot driver, Myrtilus, to betray the king. Myrtilus was to replace the lynchpins of the king’s chariot with copies made of wax. In return for his betrayal, Pelops promised half the kingdom to Myrtilus after the king lost the race and was killed.

When the race began Oenmaus was able to keep up with Pelops but right on schedule the golden wings popped out of the crooked suitor’s chariot. The king was left in a cloud of dust.

Oenmaus ordered Myrtilus to force the horses to go faster but he had other plans. The once faithful student ejected out of the chariot just before it self destructed. Oenmaus was then dragged to his death cursing the name of Myrtilus.

Pelops proceeded to marry Hippodamia and live happily ever after with the queen of the kingdom.

Myrtilus was happy for the new couple but he still wanted his half of the kingdom. A deal was a deal.

He confronted Pelops, demanding his share, but crooked as he was, Pelops stalled him, claiming that his lawyers were drawing up all the papers that would be ready in a few days.

Myrtilus was satisfied with this explanation and went walking off. Just as he did, Pelops, with his inherited godly powers, kicked Mytilus so hard that he went flying in the heavens and magically became the constellation we know today as Auriga.

No one knows exactly how the betraying chariot driver got the mama goat and baby goats on his shoulder, but the leading theory is that they were added by shepherds as they watched their flocks by night.

Again, look for Auriga the charioteer turned goat farmer in the low eastern evening sky. See if you can spot the dim triangle of stars that make the baby goats to the lower right of Capella.

For early morning risers there’s a really great celestial hugging coming on in the low eastern sky. The bright planets Venus and Saturn start out this week less than 10 degrees apart, which is about the width of your clenched fist held at arm’s length. Venus is the brighter of the two to the upper right of Saturn.

Next week, the last week of November, Venus and Jupiter will be almost touching. I’ll have more on the one of best celestial events of 2012 next week in Starwatch.

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis/St/ Paul and is author of the book, “Stars, a Month by Month Tour of the Constellations” published by Adventure Publications available at bookstores and at www.adventurepublications.net.