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Aries the Ram
Κριός
Dylan Fabert
Physics 1040 Section
Constellation Paper
Mythology
Roughly 2,000 years ago Aries was located over the equinox, (the point where the sun
crosses the celestial equator from north to south) because of this, the Babylonians identified it to
be the starting point of the zodiac ("Aries Constellation"). However, this is credited to the
revisions the Neo-Babylonians did to the Babylonian zodiac, which placed Alpha Arietis, Hamal,
very close to the vernal equinox.
In Greek mythology the ram, Aries, with the Golden Fleece was sought by Jason and the
Argonauts. Jason was the son of Aeson and became famous for his role as the leader of the
Argonauts and their quest for the Golden Fleece, but how did they know about the Golden
Fleece?
The Boeotian King had two children, a son named Phrixus and a twin sister Helle. After
Nephele, king Athamas’s first wife, died the king took a new wife named Ino. Ino had an
incredibly deep hate for her new step children and had to find a way to get rid of them. After
thinking and thinking Ino had finally came up with the perfect plan and was ready to set it into
action! The only problem was she didn’t account for intervention of the Gods.
The first part of Ino’s plan was to set the land into famine by sabotaging the seeds, before
the sow, to ensure the wheat crops would fail. Because of her success the crops failed and the
land went into famine. As an attempt to solve the problem and make things right again King
Athamas sent a man to consult the Oracle at Delphi. Ino intercepted the man and bribed him to
lie to the King by telling him the only way to keep the people from starvation was by sacrificing
his children. Because of the King’s desperation he agreed and began the sacrifice process.
The children’s real mother, the cloud nymph Nephele, saw this catastrophe in action and
knew she had to help. As the children were about to die, a winged ram with golden wool, sent by
their mother, swooped down for their rescue. Both children were rescued and the ram took them
East toward Colchis. On the journey the ram passes over a strait where Helle fell off and
unfortunately drown in the Dardanelles, because of this tragedy the strait was renamed
Hellespont or sea of Helle in her memory.
Upon arrival at Colchis, Phrixus presented King Aeetes with the Golden Fleece from the
ram Aries, and in return the King gave Phrixus his daughter’s hand. (Napoli, Treasury of Greek
mythology: classic stories of gods, goddesses, heroes & monsters, 2011).
The Constellation and Stars
According to seasky.org the constellation Aries is located at 2.66 hours right ascension
and 20.09 degrees declination ("December Constellations"). However as found on table #1 below
the brightest star in Aries (Hamal) is located at about 2 hours RA and 23 degrees DEC, just a
little off. As seen in figure #1, to the right, Aries is bordered by Perseus, Triangulum, Pisces,
Cetus, and Taurus. Perseus is known for beheading medusa and saving Andromeda, (located just
above Triangulum) from the sea God Cetus the sea monster sent by Poseidon to ravage the coast
of Cepheus’s territory. Triangulum is a small constellation above Aries that is named for its three
brightest stars that make a long skinny triangle.
Pisces is the representation of two fish that
escaped the wrath of Typhon and is seen in the
night sky as two fish tied together. Taurus
represents another one of Zeus’s disguises, the
one where he carried away Europa, Zeus
disguised himself as a bull and is therefore seen
as a bull in the night sky.
Image # 1 ("First Point of Aries")
Aries is visible between latitudes 90 and minus 60 degrees, (however most websites say
it’s a northern constellation) and is best seen in December around 21:00, or 9:00 PM. As stated
on space.com Aries is a mid-sized constellation and ranks 39th in size, among the 88 modern
constellations, with a whopping 441 square degrees (Zimmermann, "Aries Constellation: Facts
About the Ram"). Although Aries is called the ram I think it’s extremely hard to see a ram out of
the stars in the
constellation. As seen in
image # 2 to the right the
three brightest stars
merely make out a line
from one side of the ram
to the other and in my
opinion the rest could be
filled in with any
drawing you choose.
Image # 2 ("Pics about Space")
Primary Stars
On Table #1 below is found the name, right ascension, declination, visual magnitude,
distance in light years, and spectral class of the 20 brightest stars found in Aries.
Table #1 ("List of stars in Aries")
Deep Sky Objects
There are a few deep sky objects in Aries worth mentioning; NGC 772, a pair of galaxies
NGC 678 and 680, and even meteor showers. All of the deep sky objects above can be seen
through an amateur telescope but because of the huge distance Aries is found from earth many of
Name
RA
DEC
Vis. Mag.
Distance (ly)
Spectral Class
α Ari
Hamal
02h 07m 10.29s
+23° 27′ 46.0″
2.01
66
K2III
β Ari
Sheratan
01h 54m 38.35s
+20° 48′ 29.9″
2.64
60
A5V...
41 Ari
Bharani
02h 49m 58.99s
+27° 15′ 38.8″
3.61
159
B8Vn
δ Ari
Botein
03h 11m 37.67s
+19° 43′ 36.1″
4.35
168
K2IIIvar
HD 20644
03h 20m 20.37s
+29° 02′ 54.6″
4.47
640
K2II-III
39 Ari
02h 47m 54.44s
+29° 14′ 50.7″
4.52
181
K1III
γ2 Ari
01h 53m 31.80s
+19° 17′ 45.0″
4.62
164.0
kA0hA3(IV)SiSr
35 Ari
02h 43m 27.11s
+27° 42′ 25.8″
4.65
370
B3V
γ1 Ari
01h 53m 31.77s
+19° 17′ 38.7″
4.70
164.0
B9.5IV
λ Ari
01h 57m 55.78s
+23° 35′ 45.9″
4.79
133
F0V
ζ Ari
03h 14m 54.11s
+21° 02′ 40.7″
4.87
340
A1V
14 Ari
02h 09m 25.29s
+25° 56′ 23.9″
4.98
320
F2III
κ Ari
02h 06m 33.91s
+22° 38′ 54.3″
5.03
187
A2m
ι Ari
01h 57m 21.03s
+17° 49′ 03.3″
5.09
659
K1p...
τ2 Ari
03h 22m 45.27s
+20° 44′ 31.6″
5.10
319
K3III
38 Ari
02h 44m 57.51s
+12° 26′ 45.5″
5.18
125
A7III-IV
ε Ari A
02h 59m 12.70s
+21° 20′ 25.0″
5.2
332
A2Vs
η Ari
02h 12m 47.98s
+21° 12′ 39.5″
5.23
98
F5V
π Ari
02h 49m 17.56s
+17° 27′ 51.6″
5.26
603
B6V
τ1 Ari
03h 21m 13.61s
+21° 08′ 49.7″
5.27
462
B5IV
the other deep sky objects can’t (“Home”). However there are still some pretty cool pictures of
some of these galaxies.
NGC 772 (image # 3) is both the largest and brightest of the galaxies located inside of
Aries borders and is therefore the easiest to see. 772 has an apparent magnitude of 10.3 and is
located nearly 130 million light years from earth it’s RA is 01h 59m 19.6s its DEC is +19deg 00’
27’’ and is an SA(s)b galaxy. This galaxy has many spiral arms giving it the classification of a
spiral galaxy. “Most notable is, however, a
prominent elongated outer spiral arm, which
has likely arisen due to tidal interactions with
the nearby dwarf elliptical galaxy NGC 770.
Image # 3 ("NGC 772, an unbarred spiral galaxy in Aries")
This unusual long arm shows lots of young
blue star clusters. But NGC 772 also
possesses many weak, tightly coiled arms
which, although well formed, are relatively
smooth, indicating only a small current rate of star formation. The relatively smooth multiple
arms on the opposite side from the prominent arm are defined primarily by spiral dust lanes.”
(“NGC 772, an unbarred spiral galaxy in Aries”).
Also found within the borders of Aries is a pair of galaxies, NGC 678 and NGC 680
(image # 4) both are apart of the group called NGC 691 both galaxies are located aproximetly
130 million light years away. These galaxies are really
cool because they interact with eacother and look
awsome in a photograph. NGC 678 has a magnitude of
13.35, has a diameter of 171,000 light years, and is
classified as SB(s)b: sp. NGC 680 has a magnitude of
12.9, has a diamiter of on 72,000 light years, and is
classified as E+ pec. “NGC 678 is an edge-on spiral
galaxy that is 4.5 by 0.8 arcminutes. NGC 680, an
elliptical galaxy with an asymmetrical boundary, is the
Image # 4 ("Aries")
brighter of the two at magnitude 12.9; NGC 678 has a
magnitude of 13.35.” (“Aries (Constellation)”).
Aries also finds itself home to a few meteor
showers that come streaming down into Earth’s
atmosphere (image # 5). Only very few are ever seen
because the sun is above the horizon when Earth feels
the effects. “The Daytime Arietid meteor shower is
one of the strongest meteor showers that occurs
during the day, lasting from 22 May to 2 June. It is an
Image # 5 ("Arietid meteor shower")
annual shower associated with the Marsden group of comets that peaks on 7 June with a
maximum zenithal hourly rate of 54 meteors. Its parent body may be the asteroid Icarus. The
meteors are sometimes visible before dawn, because the radiant is 32 degrees away from the
Sun. They usually appear at a rate of 1–2 per hour as "earthgrazers", meteors that last several
seconds and often begin at the horizon. Because most of the Daytime Arietids are not visible to
the naked eye, they are observed in the radio spectrum. This is possible because of the ionized
gas they leave in their wake.” (“Aries (Constellation)”).
Bibliography
Aries. (n.d.). Retrieved November 30, 2015, from
http://www.peoplesguidetothecosmos.com/constellations/aries.htm
Aries (Constellation). (n.d.). Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aries_(constellation)
Aries Constellation. (n.d.). Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
http://www.constellation-guide.com/constellation-list/aries-constellation/
Arietid meteor shower. (n.d.). Retrieved November 30, 2015, from
http://spaceweather.com/meteors/arietids.html
December Constellations. (n.d.). Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
http://www.seasky.org/constellations/constellations-december.html
First Point of Aries. (n.d.). Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Point_of_Aries
Home. (n.d.). Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
http://freestarcharts.com/14-guides/constellation/370-aries-constellation-guide
List of stars in Aries. (n.d.). Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stars_in_Aries
NGC 772, an unbarred spiral galaxy in Aries. (n.d.). Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
http://annesastronomynews.com/photo-gallery-ii/galaxies-clusters/ngc-772/
Napoli, D., & Balit, C. (2011). Treasury of Greek mythology: Classic stories of gods, goddesses, heroes &
monsters. Washington: National Geographic Society.
Pics about Space. (n.d.). Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
http://pics-about-space.com/aries-constellation-nasa?p=2#
Zimmermann, K. (n.d.). Aries Constellation: Facts About the Ram. Retrieved November 29, 2015, from
http://www.space.com/17052-aries-constellation.html