The celestial showcase for all our dreams is the night sky and studies of it have historical placement in both ancient and modern cultures. In the past, for instance, farmers have used the state of the night sky as a calendar to determine when to plant crops. Many cultures have drawn constellations between stars in the sky, using them in association with legends and mythology about their deities. To really appreciate the wonder of what our ancestors saw in the heavens one needs to be away from any source of light pollution on a clear moonless night.
Constellations are totally imaginary things that poets, farmers and astronomers have made up over the past thousands of years. The real purpose for the constellations is to help us tell which stars are which, nothing more. On a moonless night in the KerryIDSR you can see many thousands of stars and trying to tell which is which is hard. The constellations help us by breaking up the sky into more manageable bits and grouping stars together in patterns which we call constellations. Since different constellations are visible at different times of the year, you can use them to tell what month it is. For example, Scorpius is only visible in the northern hemisphere’s evening sky in the summer.
The manager of the KerryIDSR has written a book ‘Constellation Stories of Ireland’ see below, or go check it our here;
NOTE: If you do not have a flash player installed this video of what is happening in tonight’s sky won’t work – sorry!