Re: Aldebaran

["Bradley E. SCHAEFER" <schaefer@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi;
	Could you please give me another explanation of your proposed
system.  For example, I do not understand how the four asterisms can all
be at the same right ascension.  And I do not understand how alignments
are indicated nor how they point at anything and where is sunrise in the
VMS.  Perhaps I missed this from an earlier email, but a restating should
not harm much.
	One caution is that the accuracy of other similar historical
systems is not high, so we need not pick just an asterism close to some
precalculated RA.  For example, the Chinese seasonal marker asterisms were
all very large and loosely laid out if you were looking to exactly quarter
the sky.  Similarly, the ancient Royal stars (Aldebaran, Regulus, Antares,
and I think Spica {?}) don't quarter the sky with any accuracy.  So 180
degrees from the Pleiades is near the Scorpio/Libra border and we need not
take Alpha/Beta/Gamma Libra as the nearest triangle.
	Within the paradigm of asterisms that quarter the sky near the
ecliptic, the Waterjar of Aquarius is a reasonably good match as being 90
degrees from the Pleiades, is a well known and stand-alone asterism near
the ecliptic with the right star placement.  So I have tried looking up
names for these stars in a variety of the usual references.  (The most
thorough although not error free is Allen's Star Names and their Lore.)
The Waterjar is variously called the Urn (western), the Felicious Tent
(Arab), Situla (Latin), and Kappa-alpha-lambda-pi-eta (Greek).  The four
stars are Gamma, Zeta, Pi, and Eta Aquarii, although these names
definitely postdate the VMS.  The only uniquely ID's star (within the
above paradigm) is the center star of the asterism (Zeta Aquarii).
Unfortunately, I can find no names at all.  Pi Aqr was called the 'Seat'
by Grotius.  Gamma Aqr is called Sadachbia from the Arabic Al Sa'd al
Ahbiyad which apparently means something like 'Lucky Star of Hidden
Things'.  Eta Aqr has no given names either.  So some of the above names
might be cribs for the labels of the VMS waterjar.
	I am reminded of something I have worked on extensively a decade
ago - the lunar lodge systems.  These are kind-of-like a zodiac with 28
(or 27) asterisms close to the ecliptic used by the Chinese, Indians, and
Arabs (for just the main systems).  {My research was to use the
determinative stars and various positional correlations to date the origin
of the lodges using precession as a tool.  I foudn that the Chinese system
definitely came first and its date was 3000+-1000 BC or so, while the
Indian lodge system was founded 1700+-800 BC and the Arab system at
300+-1000 BC.}  Many of the asterisms have two or three stars, often
fairly faint.  I will check tonight to see if I can find any reasonalbe
matches...
Cheers,
Brad