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Ephemeris: 05/08/2026 – The story of Boötes and Ursa Major

May 8, 2026 Leave a comment

This is Ephemeris for Friday, May 8th. Today the Sun will be up for 14 hours and 33 minutes, setting at 8:56, and it will rise tomorrow at 6:21. The Moon, 1 day before last quarter, will rise at 2:55 tomorrow morning.

Appearing in the eastern sky at 10 p.m. tonight is the kite shaped constellation of Boötes the herdsman. The bright star Arcturus is at the bottom of the kite which is horizontal to the left, pointed to by the arc of the handle of the Big Dipper, higher in the east. The Big Dipper is the hind end of the constellation Ursa Major, the Great Bear. In one story, Boötes represents a young hunter named Arcas, son of Callisto, a beautiful young woman who had the misfortune of being loved by god Zeus. Zeus’ wife, Hera, found out about the affair, and since she couldn’t punish Zeus, turned the poor woman into a bear. Arcas, many years later, unaware of why his mother disappeared, was about to kill the bear when Zeus intervened and placed them both in the sky, where he continues to chase her across the sky nightly.

The astronomical event times given in this blog are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan (Lat 44.7° N, Long 85.7° W; EDT, UT – 4 hours) unless stated otherwise. Times will be different for other locations.

Addendum

A GIF finder image for the constellations Boötes, Ursa Major, and Canes Venatici. It shows, in three frames: the sky as it would appear high in the east, the same image with constellation lines, and the art from the Stellariam app. See the caption for the image below for the inclusion of Canis Venatici.
A Google Gemini AI image created from a prompt I made which encapsulated the encounter of Arcas and the bear.
This is a Google Gemini AI image created from a prompt I made which encapsulated the encounter of Arcas and the bear in very sketchy terms. The source that it referenced turned out to be my April 26, 2019 Ephemeris post which is virtually identical to the one today. It was illustrated with a 17th century woodcut, which looked nothing like this image. I was kinda hoping it would have found another source, somewhere. I can’t be the only one. This is the second mythological image I requested from Gemini, and in both cases it created an image in the style of a renaissance painter. I noticed too that the bear has a look of recognition on its face. Gemini also included hunting dogs. Of course, Arcas would have had hunting dogs, and there is a constellation of the hunting dogs nearby. It’s just two stars, called Canes Venatici. I’ve ignored its part of the story all these years, so starting now I’m adding it in.
Categories: Constellations, Ephemeris Program, Mythology, Observing Tags: , , , , ,