What is another name for the constellation Aquarius and where did it originate from?

Answer 1

Aquarius or Aquarii, like many other constelations, was named by the Greeks and then the Romans. The Greek named the constelation that way because, to them, it resembled the figure of a man, and when considering fainter humanly visible stars, it resembles the image of a man with a bucket from which is pouring a stream.
The myth of aquarius is related to Ganymede, a young woman that in Greek legends caused Zeus to fall in love with her, and ended up being carried by him to Olympus to be the cupbearer of the Gods.

The name Aquarius passed to the romans as Aquarii, and then to the rest of civilization....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquarius

Answer 2

The Water Bearer

Answer 3

Aquarius, the Waterbearer. If you look closely, you may see what looks like a boy dangling down from the sky.


In different places there is different significance:

according to the Arabs, is a constellation associated with the rainy season of the ancient middle east. Persian, Syrian and Turkish languages call it the Water Bucket. The Egyptians associated these stars with Khnum, their god of water, who caused the Nile to overflow when he dipped his water bucket into the river. Remember the importance of the overflowing Nile as it brought nutrients and fertility to the crops. The Egyptian heiroglyph for water is the same as the sign used by astrologers for Aquarius, a pair of wavy lines suggesting the surface of a river. At times the constellation has been depicted as an *** carrying two water lugs on its back.

The Greeks held to this same idea, but named the constellation for Ganymede, the Trojan boy carried off to Mount Olympus to serve as cup-bearer to the gods.

Aquarius is the first sign of the zodiac in India, where its patron saint is Varuna. This ancient god was originally the all-powerful lord of all the heavens and creator of the stars. But later he was looked on as just god of the water who looked down on the Earth through the thousand eyes of the stars. From his throat issued the seven streams of heaven. Varuna patrols his realm on a fabulous steed, half crocodile and half bird. So he is quite able to patrol both the air and the sea.

The stars of Aquarius lie between those of Pisces and Capricornus along the ecliptic. To the north is the Great Square of Pegasus, and to the south is the first-magnitude star Fomalhaut. Thus it is an important star group, although it has only a few important stars. Its alpha star, Sadalmelik, is only at magnitude 3.2, and there are only about 20 other stars brighter than fifth magnitude. However, some of these stars form asterisms, star patterns such as the Water Jar, a trefoil (resembling the Mercedes-Benz symbol) of Pi, Gamma, and Eta-Aquarii surrounding Zeta. This Y-shaped group lies to the east of Sadalmelik. Zeta-Aquarii is one of a number of interesting double stars. It is a beautiful pair of fourth-magnitude stars separated by about 3 arcseconds. The colors of the pair are given as pale green and pale yellow. Another star of note is R-Aquarii, a Mira-type variable star which, over the space of a year, changes from a dim magnitude 11 to a magnitude of six.

There are three Messier objects in Aquarius, including M2 and M72, both globular clusters. M2 is one of the better clusters and one which can be visible to a keen-eyed observer on a really dark night. In a small telescope it becomes a ball of faint stars of magnitude 13. M73 is a rather unusual object among those listed by Messier. It is only a small group of stars of similar magnitude that are possibly associated as a multiple-star system. It is also referred to as NGC 6994. First observed in October 1780, M73 was described by Messier as “three or four small stars which look like a nebula at first sight” and contain “a little nebulosity.” Yet no photograph of M73 has ever revealed nebulosity around these stars. The four stars form the shape of a Y, and their magnitudes range from 10.5 to 12.0.

Two planetary nebulae take preeminence in a long list of other deep-sky objects in Aquarius. The Saturn Nebula, when seen through a telescope, is a small blue-green dot that Lord Rosse thought looked like a ringed planet.

The other, the Helix Nebula, NGC 7293, is the closest planetary nebula to us and occupies an area about half the diameter of the full Moon. This marvelous deep-sky object can be seen in binoculars from dark skies. A cloud of gas and dust ejected from a central star, it resembles a dim smoke ring. Planetary nebulae were named by Sir William Herschel in 1785 because in telescope views they may resemble planets. About a thousand of these shells of stars in their final stages of evolution from giants to dwarfs are known. The central stars are usually blue in color with temperatures up to 400,000K.

The planet Neptune was discovered among the stars of Aquarius 154 years ago, in 1846, after its presence had been predicted and calculated from irregularities in the orbit of Uranus. Aquarius is also the radiant location for several meteor showers, including the Eta Aquarids of May, the North Delta Aquarids which peak on July 29, the South Delta Aquarids which peak on August 13, and the lesser Iota Aquarids, also of August.


Aquarius is a member of the Zodiac, a group of constellations that the Sun travels through each year. It is best viewed in the fall in the southern sky, although much of the northern hemisphere can see the Waterbearer in the spring. Aquarius is one of the oldest constellations in the sky.

In Greek myth, Aquarius was Ganymede, the young boy kidnapped by Zeus. Zeus sent his eagle, Aquila, to snatch Ganymede out of the fields where the boy was watching over his sheep. Ganymede would become the cupbearer for the Olympian gods. The constellation, Crater, is often thought to be Ganymede's cup.

The Sumerians also believed that Aquarius brought on a sort of global flood. Also, many of the stars that make up Aquarius have names that refer to good luck. This is most likely due to the time of year when the Sun would rise in Aquarius. It happened to be at the same time when the rainy season began in the Middle East.

You have to use some imagination to see a figure of a boy in the sky. Look at the constellation in the same position as the one pictured. The head is on the right end. Moving left, you can see what could be an arm dangling down. Continue left more, and you come to the lower half of the body. Notice the legs are bent. This may represent the position of Ganymede while being carried by Aquila to Mount Olympus.

There are three globular clusters in Aquarius that may be viewed through a small telescope. The planetary nebula, named the Saturn Nebula, is also in the Waterbearer.. It is so named because it looks like the planet Saturn when viewed through a telescope. The closest and brightest planetary nebula is the Helix Nebula, located directly east of the "foot".

Answer 4

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquarius#Astrology