The cosmic trumpet announcing the equinox will sound on Saturday,
September 23, at 1:54 by Universal Time. So on this occasion I’ve set our picture for the Mountain time zone of North America because there this scene, three quarters of an hour after sunset, almost exactly coincides with the instant of the equinox. Clocks in this zone being six hours earlier than at Greenwich, the scene occurs on Friday evening.
The Sun is underground, but you can see, by eyeing the celestial equator and the ecliptic, that it is at the point where they cross. The Sun at this moment falls into the southern celestial hemisphere.
(And underground beside the Sun is Mercury. It was at superior conjunction beyond the Sun on Sep. 21 at 2h UT.)
The ecliptic is the line along which the Sun appears to travel, but it is often visually marked for us by the planets. And at this time we have a row of them: from right to left, Venus, Jupiter, Saturn (and invisible dwarf planet Pluto). But Venus happens to be making a deep loop south of the ecliptic, as it swings inward to pass between us and the Sun on October 26.
Part of an ecliptic-based chart for Venus in 2018, to be in the “Longer View” book for Venus that I am working on.
And this illustrates, as Eric David has pointed out to me, that the ecliptic as spangled by the bright planets can appear to slope differently. In our evening sky it now looks much steeper – from Venus up to Jupiter is closer to vertical than to the ecliptic’s gentle angle to the horizon.
Eric noticed this effect while driving home on Sep. 21 to Fredericksburg, Virginia, and took this photo, which I may not have captured very well.
He annotated it and posted it at https://www.flickr.com/photos/starvergnuegen/44762958322/in/dateposted-public/ He says that “the field of view is very close to 24 degrees wide from left to right edge… I used a lens that gives a slightly telephoto view, so that should be taken into account when looking at how far Venus appears to be from the ecliptic.”
Now, as to “starling” and “starboard”: I asked you what they have to do with stars, and the answer is: Nothing.
The right side of a ship is “starboard” because on that side was fixed the oar to “steer” with. When the ship docked, its other side was placed against the “port.”
The old word for the bird was “stare,” similar to forms in other Germanic languages; the “-ling” diminutive ending was added later, though still in the Old English stage of the language.
But, as Marcia observed in childhood, starlings could be so called because their otherwise drab plumage is speckled with stars. It is astonishing that these gregarious birds, whom I used to see blackening the sky as they gathered to roost on a wooded island in Manchester, are now threatened. There was a pair who learned to alight for crumbs on the palms of our hands on a terrace in Lyme Regis; no more.
As legend has it, starlings were first brought over from Europe to Central Park where managers of ‘Shakespeare in the Park’ thought it would be only appropriate to have the birds of Bill’s native country to inhabit the stage. That was back sometime in the 1800’s.Since then the starling population in the US of A has soared to astronomical numbers. Want any of ’em back?
It is true that starboard refers to the side of the boat with the steering oar. The connection between starboard and stars that both words come from the Middle English word Stera. Sailors navigate by observing the stars.
Guy, I think you’ve missed the boat as they say on this one. Starboard was the side of the boat opposite the sail so the side from which you could best view the stars at night. Starling is the only bird that flies in masses in perfect unison like the stars appear to do.
Ingenious suggestions! But do you have any references to support either of them?
The Oxford English Dictionary traces “starboard” to Dutch and other Germanic languages and says: “This side of the ship was so called with reference to the single side rudders used in early Germanic ships, which were typically suspended on the right side of the vessel (for comfortable use by a right-handed helmsman).”
On a square-rigged ship, the sails are across the ship. With lateen rigging (which was invented later), I think most of the triangular sail is indeed to the left of the mast most of the time.
The cover painting of my Astronomical Calendar 1977 shows my view past the sails as I was steering toward the Bahamas.
Unfortunately, my Astronomical Calenders predating 2005 are not readily available and I have no handy sources for my derivations of the two words. This will require considerable research and I will let you know should it be successful.
You made no mention of my theory. Maybe you missed my comment because of the computer glitches. Starboard does refer to the side of the ship with the steering oar but the connection between star and steer is that both words are derived from the Middle English root word Stera. Sailors would steer their ship according to the location of the stars.
Rick, I do appreciate this speculation, but it, like Marcia’s about “starling”, may be without evidence.
Philologists trace the verb “steer” to an obsolete noun “steer” (last used in the 16th centurt), meaning “rudder”, which goes back to a Germanic root steur-, meaning a staff or stake, perhaps cognate with Greek stauros, “cross”.
There is apparently no indication that these are connected with the root that gave rise to “star”, German Stern, Latin stella, Greek astêr, Persian setâre.
(I was unable to give this reply to you yesterday because of an internet problem.)
Back in 2010, I managed to view Venus in the daytime with my telescope on the date of inferior conjunction. This year, one 8-year cycle later, I hope to do the same thing. Even though Venus is south of the Sun this time, the clear skies of late October / early November here in Virginia actually give us one of the better chances to see it at inferior conjunction.