The Hydra

The Hydra was a mighty monster and is living with the stars.

The Hydra constellation is the largest of the eighty-eight constellations in the night sky. Its brightest star, Alphard, is known as the “Heart of the Hydra.” It has a magnitude of one point ninety-eight, or two. The constellation is not one of the brightest in the sky but it takes up a space of one thousand three hundred three square degrees in the night sky, between the latitude of fifty-four degrees to negative eight-three degrees. It takes a full seven hours for it to rise at night. There are two meteor showers associated with the Hydra, Alpha Hydrids and Sigma Hydrids. ("April Constellations.", "Hydra, a Constellation for Autumn.", "Hydra Constellation.")

The mythological Hydra was much scarier than the constellation is. It lived by Lerna in Argolis, regularly terrorizing the countryside. The many heads it had would regularly eat cattle and any people it found. Eight of the nine Hydra heads where able to be destroyed by weapons, however, two more would grow back in the place of the destroyed one. The ninth head was golden and indestructible, it could not be harmed by any weapons known to man. It was the child of Echnida, a half women half serpent monster, and Typhon, who had one hundred heads. Alternatively, it was the child of Styx, the river, and the Titan, Pallas. The grandparents of the Hydra would be the unkillables Uranus, the ruler of the skies, and Gaea, or mother earth. In turn the parent of Uranus would be mother earth. The parent of mother earth would be Chaos. ("Hydra.")

The Hydra had lived for many hundreds of thousands of years by the time Heracles had come around to kill it. The killing of the Hydra was Heracles’ second labor of twe...

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...s one of the oldest and most original constellations there can be dating back to Ptolemy and the times of the ancient Greeks.

(Interview)

Works Cited

"April Constellations." - Discover the Constellations on Sea and Sky. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Feb. 2014.

Hamilton, Edith, and Steele Savage. Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes. New York, NY: Penguin Group, 1942. Print.

"Hydra, a Constellation for Autumn." Hydra, a Constellation for Autumn. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Feb. 2014.< http://www.rasnz.org.nz/Stars/Hydra.htm>

"Hydra Constellation." Constellation Guide. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Feb. 2014.

"Hydra." Hydra. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Feb. 2014.

McMackin, Will. Personal Interview. 7 Feb, 2014