Cast of Actors and Their Constellar Identities in the Poem

Constellations

A word about constellations in general. When the ancients speak of their gods bringing order out of chaos they are speaking of the division of the stars into constellations, bringing order to one of the most enigmatic puzzles in their world. The night sky was so brilliant it had to mean something, but what?  The first mention of the sky and its possible meaning seems  to have been the discovery of the sun and its position as a signal of the seasons. They built very elaborate machines, the Hinges, with their ability to signal the seasons by the movement of the sun. When its movement along the horizon to the north stopped, and in fact stood still for three or so days, they knew this designated summer, the longest of days. The stop in the sun's movement south signaled winter, the shortest days. The solstices were fixed. A simple division shows the point on the horizon where the sun is on the spring equinox and the fall equinox. The four corners of the sky, and the earth, were fixed.

Some astute observer would have seen that the sun always rose from the same set of stars on these fixed dates. The summer sun rose from the same set of stars every year; the winter sun always rose from a particular set as did the spring sun and the winter sun. The night sky has been divided into four, then twelve, different skies. Each month now has its own sky, known by the set of stars on the horizon at sunrise. The name of the sky is not important right now; what is important is the division frees the people from the dependency on the Hinge machinery; now each person has the ability to see for themselves, and anticipate, the arrival of the specific time, and the necessary actions tied to that time.

Particular Constellations

Beowulf is represented by the constellation Perseus, the generic hero. The Perseus constellation rises on the spring equinox and sets on Samhain, so any action he takes must occur between these two dates. The poet makes much of Beowulf’s chain mail, the stars of the Milky Way shining around the stars of his constellation. Olcott comments on the particular brilliance of the background stars in the constellation Perseus. (Olcott, 2004, 305) When Beowulf comes back with Grendel’s head he comes up from the pool at the ninth hour, during the daylight, so he can’t wear the chain mail. His cohorts remove it.

Grendel is the Constellation Cetus, the sea monster. “…he moved toward it / until it stood above him, a sheer keep/ of fortified gold.” (Heaney 2000, l. 714-716) That is the exact position Cetus occupies in the zodiac in relation to Heorot. (The Sky, March 25th, 540.) Cetus, Grendel, is directly below Pisces, Heorot. Though Heorot is just above him and extends right into his face, he cannot attack from there; that would be crossing the ecliptic, and that is not allowed. He must take the regular route to the ecliptic, use the well at Gemini which must be above the horizon, a means of timing his attack. His constellation rises clear on June 22nd, the summer solstice, and sets on August 22nd.

Heorot is the constellation Pisces. It is exactly as described by the poet, gold roofed, right above Cetus. The poet does change the picture a bit; he changes the Greek image of two fishes tied by a ribbon to a set of antlers and a skull.

Grendel’s mother is Lupus, a rather incomplete constellation at this latitude whose main use is to define the sky at a particular period. The poet calls her  “the wolfish swimmer.” (Heaney 2000, l. 1506) and “wolf of the deep.” (l. 1599) because the constellation Lupus, wolf in Latin, is in the waters under the earth during the spring and summer. At the latitude of the area where this poem is assumed to have been composed she rises late in November and sets in March just as Perseus is rising. Lupus and Perseus are never in the sky at the same time.

Grendel’s arm is the constellation Ursa Major. The Egyptians showed this constellation as Xepes, or Meskhetiu, the Ox Shoulder, on the Great Round Zodiac at Denderah. (Krupp 212) Illus. (Santillana, 1977, facing 217)

The constellation Puppis is the stern of the constellation Navis, one of the largest constellations in the sky. It is the ship Beowulf uses to sail to Heorot. Navis or Argo, or the Ark, is the ship that Jason, Noah and now Beowulf have used to sail the celestial waters. (Allen 1963, 66) The constellation is located close to the southern star Canopus, and barely visible as far north as Ireland or Denmark. In the Western tradition it is the only ship available in the sky. This constellation rises in late August, sets on Samhain.

Though the constellations must be up, that is clear of the horizon, to act, they do not have to be clear to have their primary stars used for timing. Menkar, the primary star located on the shoulder of Cetus, does not rise until half the constellation is up, but it is such a prominent star that it can be easily identified and used to signal some important duty for the viewer. These stars are not used to signal a particular date because they vary in their rising times depending on the latitude of the viewer. For instance, at this time Menkar, Cetus alpha, is up the last day of May at the latitude of Copenhagen, but it rises earlier, the eleventh of May, if the viewer is in Anatolia. The rising times for objects directly on the zodiac are pretty constant worldwide, but objects a distance from the zodiac can vary quite a lot in their rising, depending on their distance from the zodiac and the angle the ecliptic makes with the horizon.

 

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