A Guessing Game - or - Asteroids for Dirty Minded People

Whenever I here the word asteroids, I immediately think of Vacation when the two boys are talking and the Griswald boy asks if the kid has asteroids (referring to that great 80s video game for you young'uns out there) and the other kid says, no but his dad does and it keeps him on the john for hours.

O.K. , asteroids found around earth's orbit are called Apollo asteroids.  They are so named because the first one found was called Apollo in keeping with the trend of naming space objects after mythology figures.  I'm guessing that since Apollo flies around the earth, the name was picked (yikes, I'm talking like Yoda here).    Other asteroids were soon found and named Bacchus, Sisyphus, Icarus, and the like.  Can you guess which Greek figure (no it is not the four already mentioned) was used to name this asteroid?  A big No-prize to the person who gets it first.  I'll reveal the answer in a week or so.

The Devil's beating his wife

Did you ever hear that statement?  Supposedly it is a saying common with the Dutch and U.S. Southerners (because we have so much in common).  That's what I was always told when it is raining by the sun is shining.  Who is this wife?  More on that later.

In the 1800s, it was predicted that we have not one, but two moons.  This was based on the gravitational pull and the moon's orbit.  I'm not going to get into the science of it because 1. it is boring and 2. I don't really understand it.

The problem is that nobody had ever seen this moon.  It was theorized that this moon is always in the new phase - like our moon is when we can't see it.  This dark moon was named after the first woman in Christian mythology.  Lilith.

That's right, Eve was wife number two.  According to Christian legend, Lilith was  first and fell victim to the serpent's apple deal.  It seems that you women just can't keep away from temptation (mythologically and biblically speaking, of course - not my views...).  Anyway, unlike Lilith, she enjoyed being smarter than Adam so much that she didn't share her find with him.  Instead she spent her time hanging out with the serpent.  When God remade woman (Eve), He wouldn't let Lilith hang out around there and corrupt them.  So the devil took her in as married her.  Now when he beats her, we can see it!

But we can't see the moon named after her.  The search was on but no one found it.  O.K., so there is no moon, but what about the gravitational irregularity.  Well, to explain that, we now believe that we have what is called Trojan satellites.  Trojan because it is something that has snuck inside the orbit of our moon, much like the Trojan horse was snuck into Troy.  The satellites in this case are dust particles so disperse as not to be visible (although some astronomers have claimed to have seen them).  They are called the Kordylewski Clouds (a completely unmythical and therefore boring name).

The Brazen Bull

My life has come full circle. Let me explain...

When I was little and we only had three channels. Eventually my dad would take over and I would have to watch a documentary. The ultimate low was one time when he was watching one about the dung beetles.

Well now I'm the dad. I have control of the TV and I have hundreds of channels to choose from. What do I pick? The Discovery Channel. Yep, a channel that consists primarily of documentaries.

Well one of those was about an ancient Greek means of execution: the Brazen Bull.

It goes like this, long, long ago in a land far, far away, there was an evil king who 

hired an artist to help him come up with a new method of execution.  It had to be painful.  It had to be beautiful.  It had to last a while.  Most of all, it had to be art.  The artist, scholars think, drew upon the worship of Moloch.  Now Moloch (not one of your normal Greek deities since he came from Middle Eastern origins - better known as Baal - yep, the dude from the bible) had horns, bulls associated with him, and probably human sacrifices. 

This bull was made of bronze and was large - large enough to put someone inside.  A door was put on its back and when the victim was put in, the door could easily be shut and fastened from the outside.  Then a fire was lit underneath and the victim would then fry to death in the inside of the bull.  

Now this is nothing exceptional.  The entertainment value was nil since the bull's thick skin keeps any sound from escaping and it scents the air with burnt people (much similar to the smell of burnt popcorn (O.K., I'm guessing there - not very knowledgeable in the olfactory joys of human sacrifices)).  Not to mention the fact that the victim would suffocate before feeling too much pain (relatively speaking).  This is where the device gets it clever side.   First, herbs and flowers were put inside to mask the burnt people smell.  Then, inside the bull was a pipe coming from the mouth to where the victim would be.  The victim could get fresh air, but when screaming, the trumpet-like pipes magnified the sound so that it came out like the sound of a bull snorting/roaring/mooing.  Now that is entertainment.  So at banquets this king would bring out the bull and say, "Hey guys, lets make the bull roar!"  Great fun for all!

You can see part of this at this link: 

http://www.toptvbytes.com/index.aspx?pid=2&c=aad502e7-c7fd-47cf-91a0-6ad7b5ff1806

O.K., next time well go back in space and hit a little girl named Lilith.

The Knights Who Say . . . "Neith?"

O.K., if you have a knight with a lisp, it might come out that way.  Neith.  The next planet in our solar system.  You've heard of it, right?

Well, 1672,an astronomer noticed a small companion close to Venus and saw it again 14 years later.  Soon, other astronomers saw it too.  One guy saw it going across the sun with Venus.  So then the question was raised, planet or moon?

In 1766, Father Hell (I kid you not, his real name) declared that it was an optical illusion. In 1884, it was declared to be a planet.  They named it Neith.  According to one source it was after the mysterious goddess, whose veil no mortal raised.  See the cleverness here?  No mortal can see her, and we have a hard time seeing her.  Ha, ha.

Later, people changed their mind and said, oh, it was just a faint star that got int he way.  I mean come on, there are billions of them, no one can keep track of all of them.  The problem is that it doesn't explain the siting in front of the sun.

To make matters more mysterious, a VERY famous astronomer in the late 1800s (Barnard) shows a faint star in his recordings near Venus.  He was one of the most accurate star listers in history; however, there is no star in that vicinity.  A moon, perhaps?  Neith?  An asteroid?  No one knows.   

Now, more about Neith the goddess - here is what God Checker has to say about this Egyptian goddess: 

The Great Weaver Goddess. Upset her and she threatens to unpick the woven Universe. Bits of it already seem a little threadbare. 

She was asked by BANEBDJETET to arbitrate in the fight for power between HORUS and SET. Thanks to her, HORUS was given supremacy and SET was given two compensatory Goddesses, ANAT and ASTARTE. 

When she gets in a bad mood, she becomes the War Goddess ANOUKE.

One problem, I didn't get any veil here.  In fact, other than the source who said the planet was named this because of her veil, I can't find anyone else saying it.  Now it is not uncommon to have conflicting myths, but to find only one mention of something is usually rare.  In fact, I did find this little picture and comment from http://www.swarthmore.edu/Humanities/pschmid1/essays/Nefertari/second.chamber.html  about how little Neith wears.  Apparently Neith didn't mind showing anyone anything:

Let’s talk fashion.

One of Nefertari's guardian-spirits, the goddess Neith, wears this stunning little number as she goes about her business helping Nefertari adjust to the new experience of being dead [to the left]. Nefertari’s not sure how to handle herself, or where to turn or what to do as she starts her journey to the afterlife. Just as important: what should she wear? But Neith is there to help. And not just by standing around; Ms. Neith looks fabulous. Can anyone imagine a more elegant dress---and also a sexier one---than this one? Topless, it lets the goddess’ heavenly breasts peek out amidst the shoulder straps.

I felt that I just couldn't improve on that since my fashion taste is lacking.

I'm Your Venus

O.K., Once again I admit, my punacious titles could be better. Anyway, on we go through our solar system hitting the second? (more explanation on the question mark next solar system post) planet in our system. Venus. Named after the goddess of beauty for its beautiful star-like appearance in the sky. If you've ever marveled at a really really bright star in the early morning (even after the sun begins to come up) or early evening, you've probably have looked at Venus. Unfortunately, you can't see Venus right now.

Venus is weird in that a year on Venus is equal to 225 Earth years. Pretty cool that you would have your birthday more often. The weird thing is that a day on Venus (sunrise to sunrise) would last for 243 Earth days. That's right. Venus's day last longer than its year. See, it spins REALLY slow. As a result, it gets REALLY hot. During the daytime it gets up to 890° - that's hot enough to melt lead (for those of you who forgot your science class learning). Unlike Mercury, nighttime isn't much better because those clouds that are always present and reflect the sunlight to make this planet so bright and beautiful to us traps the heat in. we're talking global warming from Hades.

It rotates backwards (or as one of my students said, "how do we know that it's just not the only planet to spin in the right direction). Now, I assume time goes backwards here because if you remember the Christopher Reeve Superman movie, all he had to do to make time go backwards is fly around Earth backwards so many times that it began to spin backwards.

The Romans weren't the only one to name it after a deity of beauty:

• Ishtar (Babylonian goddess of beauty)
• Lucifer (Christian view of Satan as bright and morning star (but only as seen in the morning)
• Inanna (Sumerian queen goddess - she can rain fire, pretty appropriate for the actual Venus)
• The Aztecs and Mayans were scared of the light from Venus and made copious sacrifices when Venus was in the morning sky

Next - Venus doesn't have a moon...does it?

Name that god...

The following picture I think came from Wonder Woman.  I don't know since I got it from an image search long ago.  It is obviously a comic and Wonder Woman is always praying to Hera, so I figured the two match up.  Anyway, can you name the gods in order from left to right top to bottom?

There's Something About Mercury

O.K., bad pun, but I figured that no one would get my "Crazy About a Mercury" allusion.

The first real planet in our solar system is Mercury.  It has the fastest orbit, which is why it was named after the quick messenger god. Currently we have a space probe up there looking at Mercury.  As you can see 

from the picture, there is a large swath of the planet we haven't photographed yet. 

But you can see Mercury - right now (well, right now if you happen to be reading this right before sunrise).  If you find yourself up and about around thirty minutes before sunrise, you should look east (where the sun will rise).  All through October Mercury is rising.  By October 20th it will be fairly high in the sky.  You won't be able to miss it, it should be the brightest thing in the east (well, until the sun comes up).

A few facts about Mercury:

• It is the smallest planet (well now it is after they screwed Pluto over - more on that later in this series).
• Because it goes around the sun almost as fast as it spins, there are three days every two years.
• Mercury's thin atmosphere makes it blistering hot in the day time (but weirdly not the hottest planet in the system) and super cold in the nighttime despite it's closeness to the sun.

O.K., my five year son, Colby, wants to add something:

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The Mercury of mythology is better known by his Greek name, Hermes.  He is not a major player despite being one of the big 12; however, he is present in a lot of stories.  He is the god of pretty much everything not already gobbled up by the other gods.  One great story that involves him is the story of Hermaphroditos, which was my very first post on this blog.

Winged Sandals has a nice little web site where they use an annoying little Hermes to tell you all about Greek mythology.

In other mythology, Mercury was associated with:

Nabu (ancient Babylon) - god of wisdom

Apollo (Greek) - god of archery - while the Greeks saw Hermes for the planet Mercury at night, they thought it was a different planet (or wandering star) when they saw it before sunrise and figured it must be Apollo.

Enki (Sumerians) - a creator god that not only created people, but created "holding hands" as well (I think that probably deserves a planet)

Thoth (Egypt) god of writing

Odin (Norse) god of wisdom, All Father

O.K., next entry we take a break from space and then get back to it!

Solar System Mythology

Every night we look at mythology related stuff - the sky! Most things in our solar system has a name that relates it to mythology, so I thought for the next few posts we would tour the solar system (taking a break here and there for those who don't like space).

We'll start with the planet closest to the sun. Mercury right? Wrong! Vulcan.

I know, I know. You're trying to tell me that there is no such planet as Vulcan. Well, in the 1700s, in an attempt to find out why Mercury has a screwed up orbit, one astronomer predicted there would be a planet between Mercury and the sun. Why would anyone listen? This same guy had already successfully predicted Neptune using math alone. So he seemed pretty credible.

Since this planet would be so close to the sun, it would only be seen as it passed in front of the sun (Agggh! Wear protective eye gear!) or during a solar eclipse. Sure enough, when told where to look, some astronomers found what they believed to be a small planet actually crossing between Mercury and the sun. This planet was called Vulcan. Why Vulcan? Well the other planets all had cool mythological names, so they chose the hottest god (he did work in the hot forges all day) for the hottest planet.

Later, however, it was shown by Einstein that the laws of gravity allowed Mercury’s orbit. It was then proven that Vulcan doesn’t exist. *Sniff* And people thought demoting Pluto was bad...

Next - Mercury!

Banned Book Week

Finally I got rid of some virus or malware or trojan or whatever it is called and can post again. What a mess.

Anyway, this is banned book week. To celebrate I am showing my students some different books that frequently make the banned book list. Some kids want to read one of them right away since they are not supposed to read such filth.

I went looking for a mythology book that was on a list - I mean mythology has all the bad things, incest, bestiality, violence, magic, all kinds of things. I couldn't find one anywhere. The closest I came was 1001 Arabian Nights. The odd thing is that is was tagged on that list as having sex issues. Maybe I need to go back and read it. Maybe I read an abridged version. I just don't remember anything overtly sexual in it. Djinns, yes. Magic, yes. Violence, yes. Sex? Oh well.

So remember to celebrate and burn some books and stuff! Have a great week!