THE SOUTHWORTH PLANETARIUM
70 Falmouth Street Portland,Maine 04103
43.6667° N 70.2667° W
Altitude: 10 feet below sea level
Founded January 1970
2021-2022: XIII
"I've never known any trouble that an hour's reading didn't assuage." -Arthur Schopenhauer
THE DAILY ASTRONOMER
Monday, September 20, 2021
A Cloud Named Helen
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For those who've just joined:
Every so often, the DA waxes mythological.
The night sky is not merely astronomical.
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Ask the ancient Greeks and they would have told you: Eris, the goddess of discord, was trouble with a capital P. Unlike most people saddled with a sullied reputation, Eris earned hers a hundred times over. She was, after all, the goddess of discord, also known as the personification of strife. One could ascribe every human disturbance, from the passing tiffs that perturb the tender love of newlyweds to the tectonic tumults of continent-wide conflicts, to that dastardly daughter of night and shadow (a.k.a. Nyx and Erebus). Understandably, she had neither temples nor admirers. Eris cared nothing for the reverence of mortals and would likely have tormented any worshipper into a state of unshakable agnosticism.
Is it any wonder that when the Olympians gathered to revel in their respective divinities that they were reluctant to include Eris? She loathed fun, frolic and fellowship, for she only derived delight from anger, upset, and the kind of awkward tension that makes the surrounding air feel like supercooled custard. So, when Peleus and Thetis were to be wed in a grand ceremony, Eris alone was excluded. Eris avenged this slight by tossing a golden apple into the crowd. Attached to this gilded fruit was the label, "For the fairest." Aphrodite, Athena and Hera, three of the most powerful goddesses, each claimed the apple for their own. They went to Zeus and asked him to decide which of them was the most worthy of the apple. Zeus wisely recused himself and instructed the three goddesses to visit the Trojan prince Paris and have him decide.
All the goddesses offered Paris a bribe. Athena offered him profound wisdom. Hera tried to bribe Paris with a promise of wide-spread political influence. Aphrodite, who actually knew a thing or two about young, hot-blooded men, promised him the most beautiful woman in the world. Paris gave Aphrodite the apple. (Should we be surprised?)
Well, we know what happened next. Aphrodite helped Paris to kidnap Helen, the world's most beautiful woman. Unfortunately, she was married to Menelaus, the King of Sparta. All the Hellenistic kings and their warriors were obligated to defend the marriage and so Helen's abduction led to the mobilization of the greatest armada ever assembled. The Greek assault on Troy precipitated the decade-long Trojan War. The Greeks ultimately prevailed, in no small measure because of Odysseus' clever and now famous contrivance known as the Trojan Horse. Troy was destroyed and Helen was returned to her rightful husband. (Whether she wanted to be or not.)
And that was the end of it... or was it?
When Paris decided to give the apple to Aphrodite, he incurred the implacable hatred of both Hera and Athena. (It was fear of this hatred that induced Zeus to foist the task of deliberation onto Paris.) Both goddesses became avowed enemies of Troy in general and of Paris in particular. While Athena undid Troy by inspiring the Trojan Horse idea in Odysseus-with whom she was secretly in love- Hera exacted her revenge much earlier. Just before Paris abducted Helen, Hera spirited her away to Egypt. She then crafted a cloud form in Helen's precise image. Hera then bewitched the cloud to sound, behave and even feel exactly like Helen. Through the ensuing ten years, neither Paris nor anyone else ever realized that they were waging a vicious and protracted war over a curvaceous cumulonimbus.
Now, say what you will about Hera, but that's revenge.
Mostly cloudy
Tomorrow....did something just hit Jupiter?
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