At this point, we invite the reader to jump about.
A beginning stargazer typically finds that some parts of the sky are just more interesting than others.
While we’ve sought to make each chapter interesting in its own way, some chapters are just more fun than others.
If you’d like to jump ahead to some of the more fun stuff in the lines of Hipparchus, we recommend you visit Chapters 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, or 12.
And among the lines of Ptolemy, our favorites are Chapters 14, 15, 19, 21, 22, and 23.
These opening chapters contain a lot of interesting information (well, we find it interesting. . .).
But we want to assure the reader that there’s some really cool stuff ahead.
* * * * * * * *
We propose that the original identification and cataloging of the stars was done using star alignments, such as those we explore in these chapters.
The nebulous Coma (or Hair) is identified by Ptolemy by means of 3 modest stars ‘in the figure of an ivy leaf’. Here, we identify these three stars by alignments involving stars of Leo and Ursa Major.
Ptolemy does not count the Hair as a separate constellation in his Catalogue. Instead, the three stars defining it are counted among the ‘unfigured’ stars near the Lion.
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