The Bear in the Stars

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Follow up from Orion’s knees past his belt to find his shoulders. His shoulder on your left is a red giant star called Betelgeuse. The shoulder on the right is a star called Bellatrix.

Gajdoš, Štefan (2008-06-01). "Search for Past Signs of October Ursae Majorids". Earth, Moon, and Planets. 102 (1): 117–123. Bibcode: 2008EM&P..102..117G. doi: 10.1007/s11038-007-9196-9. ISSN 1573-0794. S2CID 123555821. Although this part of the constellation represents the Great Bear’s hind legs and tail, these bright stars form the popping image of a ladle. This asterism has two bright stars that can be used as a navigational pointer. These two stars are Dubhe and Merak. They point to the location of the current northern pole star, Polaris. The Romans called the constellation Septentrio, or “seven plough oxen,” even though only two of the seven stars represented oxen, while the others formed a wagon. Jenniskens, Peter (September 2012). "Mapping Meteoroid Orbits: New Meteor Showers Discovered". Sky & Telescope: 23. The reason Polaris is so important is that it is almost directly above the North Pole. This means you can use it like a compass to find north.What's more, the angle of the star above the horizon gives you your latitude (north-south position on the Earth’s surface). For years, sailors relied on the North Star for navigating at sea, with the help of instruments like quadrants and astrolabes. Finding Polaris Ursa Major contains seven Messier objects that are located within and around the constellation. The most famous of these seven are the Pinwheel Galaxy, Bode’s Galaxy, the Cigar Galaxy, and the Owl Nebula. Alioth is the brightest star in Ursa Major and the 31st brightest star in the night sky. It has an apparent magnitude of 1.76 and is approximately 81 light years distant. The star’s traditional name comes from the Arabic word alyat, which means “fat tail of a sheep.” Alioth is the star in the bear’s tail that is closest to the body of the bear. They are imprisoned and taken to King Lycaon as a gift. However, the mother and son are able to escape and take refuge in the temple of Zeus. Not realizing that their trespassing is punishable by death, Zeus comes and intervenes to save them by placing them both in the sky.

Ursa Major belongs to the Ursa Major family of constellations, along with Boötes, Camelopardalis, Canes Venatici, Coma Berenices, Corona Borealis, Draco, Leo Minor, Lynx, and Ursa Minor. Major stars in Ursa Major The two stars north of this are Orion’s shoulders. One of these is Betelgeuse (“ BEETLE-juice”), which is a giant red star. The two brighter stars to the south are hislegs. Muscida is the star that is located at the head of the bear. This star is also known as Omicron Ursae Majoris. It is a yellow giant star with a distance of around 180 light-years from earth.

Ancient Greeks associated the constellation with the myth of Callisto, the beautiful nymph who had sworn a vow of chastity to the goddess Artemis. Zeus saw the nymph one day and fell in love. The two had a son, and named him Arcas. Artemis had already banished Callisto when she had learned about the nymph’s pregnancy and broken vow. M101, The Pinwheel Galaxy lies near the handle of the Big Dipper in Ursa Major. Location in the Night Sky

In European star charts, the constellation was visualized with the 'square' of the Big Dipper forming the bear's body and the chain of stars forming the Dipper's "handle" as a long tail. However, bears do not have long tails, and Jewish astronomers considered Alioth, Mizar, and Alkaid instead to be three cubs following their mother, while the Native Americans saw them as three hunters. In episode 3, the executive chef and co-owner of Elske, a creative Chicago spot focused on American cuisine with Danish influences, shares some real talk with Sydney about bad business partners being the downfall of his and his wife, executive pastry chef Anna Posey’s previous restaurant. Mitra JouhariUrsa Major, along with asterisms it contains or overlaps, is significant to numerous world cultures, often as a symbol of the north. Its depiction on the flag of Alaska is a modern example of such symbolism. The big dipper is not a constellation, but an asterism (a familiar group of stars located within a constellation). See the image to the left (photo credit: NASA/JerryLodriguss). Among the Greek myths there are different versions of this tale. Another asserts that it is Artemis who transforms Callisto into a bear as punishment for breaking her vow of chastity. Many years later, Callisto along with Arcas become captured in a forest. However, it was Zeus’ jealous wife Hera, who was not amused by her husband’s philandering, who would do even more damage. Angered by Zeus’ betrayal, she turned Callisto into a bear.

Talitha is the star located at the bear’s front legs. It is referred to as Lota Ursae Majoris. This star is a four-star system. It contains two pairs of binary stars that are roughly 45 light-years away from earth. In spite of being the third brightest star in Ursa Major, Alkaid was designated Eta Ursae Majoris because Johannes Bayer named the stars of the Big Dipper from west to east, designating the Pointer Stars Alpha and Beta. Phecda – γ Ursae Majoris (Gamma Ursae Majoris) M82 is a nearly edgewise galaxy that is interacting gravitationally with M81. It is the brightest infrared galaxy in the sky. [19] SN 2014J, an apparent Type Ia supernova, was observed in M82 on 21 January 2014. [20] Clark, Ella Elizabeth (1963). Indian Legends of the Pacific Northwest. University of California Press. Archived from the original on 2022-05-13 . Retrieved 2019-05-01.However, Polaris does not look very bright to us because it is so far away. Polaris is 431 light years away from Earth: over 6400 million million kilometres (4000 million million miles). Legends about the Pole Star Dubhe is the 35th brightest star in the sky. Merak is also known as Ursae Majoris. It is a white star with a magnitude of 2.37. That is around three times the mass and radius of our sun.