Orion

Last week in Starwatch, I attempted to cover all of the astronomical treasures of the constellation Orion proudly shining in the Butler southern evening sky. It’s loaded with many celestial jewels, such as the red supergiant star Betelgeuse; the bright belt stars; the colossal Orion Nebula, the birthplace of countless stars and planets; and so much more. There’s just no way to cover all of Orion’s treasures in a single column.

Likewise, trying to cover all of the legends and mythological tales of the constellation Orion in a single column is just as daunting. That’s because it’s visible in the sky essentially all over the world, an imposing figure marauding across the sky with its posse of bright winter constellations, what I call “Orion and his Gang.”

When we first see him rising on his side in the late fall evenings, he appears to be extra gigantic. That’s an illusion because constellations appear larger, like the sun and the moon, when they are closer to the horizon. The illusion happens because our eyes compare their size with adjacent land objects.

Almost every ancient and not-so-ancient culture has Orion touted as a very important character in the nightly celestial theater. He’s even mentioned three times in the Bible — twice in the Book of Job and once in the Book of Amos.

Many ancient cultures associated the giant frame of Orion with the sun because almost all giants and heroes were associated with sun gods, either directly or indirectly. That was the case with the Egyptians, Phoenicians and many others. In ancient Samaria, about where present-day Iraq is now, the constellation we see as Orion was known as Uru-anna, the Light of Heaven. Some of these old stories of the constellation we know as Orion involve cannibalism, as the giant figure among the stars grew as bright as he is because he literally fed off a menu of minor gods that added to his brilliance.

Most of the best-known tales of Orion, at least in this hemisphere, involve Greek and Roman mythology. Orion the Hunter plays a big part in these celestial soap operas going nightly in the skies.

One of the Greek and Roman stories I’ve told you many times in this column was how Orion the Hunter was dating Diana, goddess of the moon and the hunt, and how her father, Zeus, sent a giant scorpion to fatally bite Orion to end the relationship. That’s a great story, but even within Greek and Roman mythology, there are other wonderful stories of my favorite heavenly hunter.

One of them involves Orion’s love for Princess Merope, the daughter of King Oenopion. King O, as I like to call him, was the king of a large island nation and was not excited about his daughter marrying this rough, around-the-edge behemoth hunter. He kept coming up with reason after reason to put off the wedding. He also sent Orion off on multiple missions with the false promise of rewarding the hunter with his daughter’s hand in marriage.

King O’s meanest trick was to promise Merope to Orion if he could rid his land of wild beasts that perpetually posed a threat to his subjects. He wanted people to feel safe from these beasts from shore to shore. Orion took on this monumental task without hesitation. He was hot for Merope. He’d do anything for his princess! He hunted night and day and day and night, and after months of slaying, he could finally report to King O that the island was beast-free. So, was Orion finally going to hear royal wedding bells?

The answer from the king was, “Nice job, Orion, but I need just a little more time to give you my royal approval.” That did it! Orion was really ticked off. He attempted to run off with Merope and elope, but the royal guards caught up with the young couple and threw Orion into prison. To make matters even worse, after all the work Orion had performed for King O, his royal highness had his henchmen pluck out Orion’s eyes and then plunked him down on a remote beach on the other side of the island.

The distraught and sightless Orion wandered hopelessly for days on end. It looked like the end for the mighty hunter, but many of the gods of Mt. Olympus took pity on him, lifted him off the island, restored his sight, and planted him on a far-off, really remote island where he hunted and fished to his heart’s content. Life was so good there that it was easy to forget his lost love. In fact, Orion did fall in love again, but that’s a tale for another time.

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and retired broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis/St. Paul. He is the author of “Stars: a Month by Month Tour of the Constellations,” published by Adventure Publications and available at bookstores and adventurepublications.net. Contact him at mikewlynch@comcast.net.