Welcome to Learn the Sky, your online resource for learning about the stars and constellations.
Welcome, my name is Janine and in this video we will review the
pattern, bright stars, celestial objects, and submythologies of the constellation known as
Hercules. Hercules is known as the hero, and he's a very ancient constellation.
Earliest records date back to the Babylonians, where Hercules was known as the 'Standing Gods'. He's
named after a Roman mythological hero which was adapted from the Greek hero Heracles. Hercules is
the fifth largest modern constellation in the sky, and it's classified as a seasonal constellation.
So when can you see Hercules? It's best seen in the Northern Hemisphere during the spring months,
and the key to finding it is looking for Corona Borealis, right here this c-shaped constellation,
and Lyra. Lyra is a small constellation, but its pattern is very distinctive, and it has a bright
star called Vega in it. If you can find these two constellations then you know that Hercules
is in between these two. Now Hercules can be a challenge to find at times because there are no
first or second magnitude stars. Most of them are a fourth magnitude, which
is fairly faint. So you want to seek out dark skies when trying to find this constellation.
Now let's review the pattern of the stars so we can become more familiar with how to
identify Hercules. So here's the official star map of Hercules, and I want to bring
your attention to a few things. First, the thing that probably stands out is this bright star in
the constellation of Lyra. That star is known as Vega, and it can be used to help you find
Hercules. Hercules is in between Lyra and Corona Borealis, and Corona Borealis has this distinctive
c-shaped pattern, and if you can find these two constellations it can help you find Hercules.
Hercules is also a really large constellation, the fifth largest in the sky, and there is two
different celestial objects that you can find within the boundaries of this constellation.
So here we have a picture, and you may not point out Hercules right away,
but if you look towards the bottom of the screen maybe you can see that c-shaped
constellation, right here Corona Borealis, and then Hercules is in this whole region up here. So
if we were to point it out, that's one version of what Hercules looks like, and notice that
one of the things with constellation patterns is that the patterns can vary, so I often just
refer to the International Astronomical Union. Those are the official star patterns, but you'll
see a variety of patterns as well as you study the stars. So here is kind of like an H shape
I like to think of, and then here are his legs coming off. So he's kneeling, this would be his head,
and then his arms come off this way. Let's get another version of this. So what probably stands
out to you is a really bright star. That's Vega, it makes up part of a constellation of Lyra,
that's right here, and then over in this can you see that c-shape pattern? That's Corona Borealis.
So if you ID these two constellations, then know that Hercules is in between.
I also...The trick I use to find Hercules is I look for the H. Here to me this looks like an H pattern,
so I know that's the body of Hercules. So let's point out what's here.
So we have Lyra, we have Corona Borealis, and then here is Hercules outlined in yellow. So
he often looks kind of upside down in this in this photograph. Here this would be considered his head,
here are his leg,s and then here are his arms. He's also nearby to Ophiuchus, which is the serpent bear,
and this little pattern right here is just the head of Draco. Draco's
a very large constellation, so you're only seeing a portion of it right here. So let's get a little
bit more practice. Here is another pattern. Can you find the C shape of Corona Borealis
towards the bottom middle of the screen and then can you find the H pattern of Hercules? So here we
go. That's where Corona Borealis is, and then this is where Hercules... and this is a longer exposure
photograph so the stars kind of come out a little bit more, but if you live in any areas with light
pollution it might be a challenge to find Hercules. Also here is the head of Draco, kind of has this
quadrilateral pattern, and then this is one of the this is the head of Ophiuchus right there,
and then finally let's get one more, one more practice shot of Hercules. So the thing that stands
out to me is the C shape from Corona Borealis, and then from there I try to look for the
H pattern of the body of Hercules. So if we were to point everything out, that's where Corona Borealis
is and then here is that each pattern of Hercules and then of course his head is cut off here, and
even his legs you can't see the full thing, but this can be a challenging constellation
to photograph because it's so large. So the key to finding Hercules is looking for Corona Borealis,
and also looking for Lyra and knowing that Hercules is in between the two.
In the last part of this video we'll look at some of the celestial objects that sit in the
boundaries of Hercules. So here we have our star map, and there's two globular clusters
that you can try to find within the boundaries of Hercules. The first is M13, and this one
is definitely visible with the naked eye if you're in a dark sky area, and this is what it looks like
if we zoom up on it, and then the other one is M92. Now I struggled to find Hercules for a long time,
but the thing that really helped me find it was M13. I was able to identify Corona Borealis and
definitely Lyra, but I struggled to see the shape, but then I started looking with my binoculars and
then found this globular cluster, and I started to put the pieces together. So let's get a closer look.
Messier 13 is sometimes called Hercules cluster, and this is thousands of stars within this cluster
and it's just estimated to be 25,000 light-years away. Now Edmund Haley found this constellation
and I loved his description of it. He said 'This is but a little patch
but it shows itself to the naked eye when the sky is serene and the Moon is absent,' so there's some
key words there. The fact that the Moon is absent is really key to seeing
this with the naked eye. If the moon is out you're probably going to struggle to see this. Now let's
get a little bit better idea of what this would look like to the naked eye. Now this is if you're
using a telescope, but it's kind of a fuzzy patch and you can kind of see the circular shape of it.
Now this is a globular star cluster estimated to be 25,000 light years away, and it contains over
300,000 stars. It's estimated to be 145 light years across and 11.65 billion years old. So it's
a very old star cluster. In fact most globular star clusters are of billions of years old.
Also there's something interesting I learned about this constellation, or
this celestial object, is that a message was sent towards the Hercules cluster in 1974 by
the Arecibo radio telescope located in Puerto Rico, and this is what the message looked like. Here it's
actually highlighted in color so you can see what the message contained, but this wasn't really meant
for other extraterrestrials to find but it was rather viewed as a way to show it to show the
the capabilities of the newly installed equipment. So it is expected that this message will reach the
Hercules cluster in 25,000 years. That's how long it'll take for it to reach there, and in fact the
this globular cluster will kind of be moved from that exact spot, but it'll land in the nearby
area which I think is pretty interesting, and finally we have oops we're going backwards here.
We have Messier 92 and this is another globular star cluster estimated be 26,700 light years away.
So this is another one that you would probably need magnification to see.
It has again about 330,000 stars and it's a little bit smaller than Messier 13. So try
to find these two celestial objects within the boundaries of Hercules,
now let's examine one of the legends behind Hercules. It is often the stories of the stars
that we can connect to in some way which can help us remember the constellation, and remember there
are many mythologies out there, so there is no one true correct mythology for any constellation.
So Hercules originated from greek mythology, from a figure known as Heracles, and Heracles was the son
of Zeus and Alcmene. Alcmene was a mortal woman and Zeus wanted her Heracles to be immortal, so he
had him suckle Hera's milk. Now at the time Hera didn't recognize Heracles and nursed him out of
pity, but he suckled so strongly that he caused Hera pain and she pushed him away, and her milk
sprayed across the heavens and this is what formed the Milky Way, and it was from this divine milk
that Heracles was able to have supernatural powers. Now Hera eventually learned that what happened
here, about what Zeus did in his infidelity, so she made Heracles life very difficult. She went
as far as casting a spell over him to make him go insane and kill his children. Once he realized
what he'd done he visited an oracle to see how he could attend for or for atone for his sins.
So the oracle sent him to one of the kings of Greece, in which he was his servant for 12 years
and this was known as the laborers of Heracles, or also in the roman version Hercules. So here's
a brief summary of the tasks. He had to kill the Nemean lion, he destroyed Hydra, he killed
a flock of marauding birds, he caught a deer with golden horns, he caught a ferocious bore, he cleaned
stables of one of the kings, he also caught a bull that was breathing fire and ravaging the lands
on Crete, and he also caught the horses of King Diomedes, he brought the king the belt of Hippolyte
one of the queen of the amazons, and here he had to steal the cattle of Gerion, and then fetch Cerberus
from the underworld, and finally steal golden apples from Hera's garden of Mount Olympus.
So there was a lot he did here, and there are many versions of this in both Greek and Roman mythology,
but as I mentioned before the mythologies of the stars vary according to time place and
culture. There's no one true mythology for any constellation, just a variety of them.
We've come to the end of our video about Hercules the hero. So let's review everything we learned so
far. It's best seen in the spring and in the early summer months in the northern hemisphere, and it's
classified as a seasonal constellation. The best way to find it is to locate Corona Borealis
and Lyra, and if you can find these two constellations then you knows
you know Hercules lies in between them, so there are a few celestial objects M13, which can be seen
with the naked eye and then M92, which you would need some magnification to see. So I wish you luck
in finding Hercules. It took me some time to find it, but once I figured out the lay of the land
and which constellations are nearby it's pretty easy to find, and it is a very large constellation.
So good luck and keep looking up. If you're new to this channel be sure to click the subscribe
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