Observing the Sky: Constellations - Introduction

Back before people had televisions and electricity to light their homes at night, they spent a lot more time looking at the stars. People all over the world used their imaginations to draw pictures in the sky, as if it were a giant connect-the-dot game.

The patterns they imagined are called constellations. People usually saw patterns that reflected their different cultures. Native Americans in North America imagined many animals and shapes from the natural world. The ancient Greeks found images of gods and goddesses in the stars. Sometimes people from very different parts of the world even imagined the same animal or shape in the same stars. Most of the constellations we recognize today were made up by the ancient Greeks around 6,000 years ago. Different constellations are visible at different times of year, so the first appearance of these patterns told farmers of the changing seasons and reminded them to plant or harvest their crops.

The constellations also help us to find our way around the night sky and to remember which stars are which. The star names we use today are mostly from Greek and Arabic, but many are changed a bit from the original, as often happens when words are passed from one language to another. It can be difficult to picture just what those folks long ago were seeing in the stars, so don't be discouraged if you have trouble seeing their patterns. You can even make up your own!

Today there are 88 official constellations, but you may find that different books show their stars connected in slightly different ways. The official constellations are specific regions of the sky, so the exact patterns are not all that important. There are some famous star patterns that use stars from only a part of a constellation, or even connect stars from different constellations. These patterns of stars that are not official constellations are called asterisms. The Big Dipper is a very famous asterism, found in the constellation Ursa Major, or Great Bear.