| Taurus | |
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Other Names |
Tauros Kretaios, Taurus Cretaeum, Bull of Crete, Bull of Heaven, Io, Zeus |
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First Appearance |
Greek Myth |
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Created by |
Greek Myth |
Origin[]
Taurus is one of the constellations of the zodiac and is located in the northern celestial hemisphere. Taurus is a large and prominent constellation in the Northern Hemisphere's winter sky. It is one of the oldest constellations, dating back to the Early Bronze Age at least, when it marked the location of the Sun during the spring equinox. Its importance to the agricultural calendar influenced various bull figures in the mythologies of Ancient Sumer, Akkad, Assyria, Babylon, Egypt, Greece, and Rome. Its old astronomical symbol is (♉︎), which resembles a bull's head.
Taurus is the second astrological sign in the modern zodiac. It spans from 30° to 60° of the zodiac. This sign belongs to the Earth element or triplicity, as well as a fixed modality, quality, or quadruplicity. It is a Venus-ruled sign, the Moon is in its exaltation here at exactly 3°. The Sun transits this sign from approximately April 20 until May 20 in western astrology. Taurus is one of the three earth signs, alongside Capricorn and Virgo. Taurus's opposite sign is Scorpio.
n the Old Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, the goddess Ishtar sends Taurus, the Bull of Heaven, to kill Gilgamesh for spurning her advances. Enkidu tears off the bull's hind part and hurls the quarters into the sky where they become the stars we know as Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. Some locate Gilgamesh as the neighboring constellation of Orion, facing Taurus as if in combat, while others identify him with the sun whose rising on the equinox vanquishes the constellation. In early Mesopotamian art, the Bull of Heaven was closely associated with Inanna, the Sumerian goddess of sexual love, fertility, and warfare. One of the oldest depictions shows the bull standing before the goddess' standard; since it has 3 stars depicted on its back (the cuneiform sign for "star-constellation"), there is good reason to regard this as the constellation later known as Taurus.
In Greek mythology, Taurus was identified with Zeus, who assumed the form of a magnificent white bull to abduct Europa, a legendary Phoenician princess. In illustrations of Greek mythology, only the front portion of this constellation is depicted; this was sometimes explained as Taurus being partly submerged as he carried Europa out to sea. A second Greek myth portrays Taurus as Io, a mistress of Zeus. To hide his lover from his wife Hera, Zeus changed Io into the form of a heifer. Greek mythographer Acusilaus marks the bull Taurus as the same that formed the myth of the Cretan Bull, one of The Twelve Labors of Heracles.
Public Domain Literary Appearances[]
All published appearances of Taurus before January 1, 1930 are in the public domain in the US.
Some notable appearances are listed below:
- Greek Lyric IV Bacchylides, Fragments
- Apollodorus, The Library
- The Argonautica
- The Library of History
- Strabo, Geography
- Description of Greece
- Plutarch, Lives
- Philostratus the Elder, Imagines
- Fall of Troy
- Dionysiaca
- Fabulae
- Astronomica
- Metamorphoses
- Fasti
- Heroides
- Propertius, Elegies
- Hercules Furens
- Phaedra
- Thebaid
- Achilleid