Subject: (urth) constellations

From: Tania Ruiz <ruiz at head-cfa.harvard.edu>
Date: Thu, 21 May 1998 13:46:38 +0000

I am briefly on this mailing list because the conversation about the
possible constellations and such is quite intriguing, and I had some
ideas. A friend of mine on this
list brought the conversation to my attention! I'm an astronomer by
trade and by hobby, so naturally, I thought I'd have a stab at
contributing. 

These are quotes from mdriussi:

> 4.  The sunlight/star is "pink," which might mean stellar > class K or M.

Well, stars don't really come in "pink", but if the star is
significantly red, such as an older star or a smaller K or M dwarf, it
will have a reddish tinge. You'd need to know its size before you could
determine this. If the star is in fact pink, well, that's a really
different universe.

> CONSTELLATIONS
> Shadow Child (with "two bright star eyes"): 

This could be a play on the region inside of Cygnus, the Swan, whose
"head", a star called Albireo, is actually a double star, and whose body
lies in a portion of the Milky Way which has a dark smudgey area of
obscuring dust known as the Rift. This dark swatch combined with the
double star might be the reference here. 

> Five Flowers:

Could be like the Pleiades, where there are six visible stars, one of
which is very dim and difficult to make out. Thus, they are five very
bright white stars close together
in a bundle. This is a dominant night sky icon in many
cultures, including Japan where it is called Subaru.

> Seeing Seed:

Could be a naked-eye, star forming region like the Orion Nebula (mark's
idea). Or any good open cluster, like M44
the Beehive.

> Dead Man (planet):

Maybe Mars, because it is so dull and red.

> Burning Hair Woman: 

This is likely a pun on Coma Berenices, or Berenice's Hair, the flowing
hair of a woman named Bernice as seen in the constellation of many stars
in the northern sky.

> Bearded Five Legs: 

We were thinking this might be like Centaurus, the centaur,
who would indeed have "beared legs". 

> Eye of Cold (star): 

Could be a very blue star like Rigel or Sirius. 

Well, there's my two cents,
Tania Ruiz

Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

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