Moon and Sea-Goat

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The modern constellations offer a convenient way to appreciate the beauty of the night sky. Using the outline of a scorpion or a lion as a landmark makes it easier to find your way around. It’s also a good way to exercise your imagination. Our imaginations don’t all show us the same pictures, though. The western constellations were passed down from ancient Greece and Rome. And many of them are even older – they came from ancient Babylon and Sumeria. But just about every culture had its own star pictures – its own map of the night sky. An example is Capricornus. In western mythology, it represents a sea-goat – half goat and half fish – perhaps a story about the god Pan. But records from…