Constellation Leo (Lion)

Properties

Leo is a conspicuous spring constellation and you can easily recognize in the stars a lying lion with its head held high or an upright lion with its head stretched out - depending on how you connect the stars. Others see in the figure a shrew with its head where the lion's rear part is and the upwardly stretched, curved tail where the lion's head is. But there is also a certain resemblance to an iron, and the western part of the star alignment resembles a sickle. [67] The brightest star, Regulus, is close to the ecliptic and so sometimes beautiful conjunctions with planets or the moon occur there. The area of the constellation is 947 square degrees and the center culminates around March 1st. ^{[9, 15]}

Stars with Proper Names:

• α Leonis: Regulus, Cor Leonis, Rex, Al Kalb Al Asad, Kabeleced
• β Leonis: Denebola, Deneb Aleet
• γ¹ Leonis: Algieba, Algeiba, Al Gieba
• δ Leonis: Zosma, Zozma, Zosca, Zozca, Duhr, Dhur, Zubra
• ε Leonis: Ras Elased Australis, Al Ras Al Asad Al Janubiyyah, Algenubi
• ζ Leonis: Adhafera, Aldhafara, Aldhafera
• θ Leonis: Chort, Coxa, Chertan
• κ Leonis: Al Minliar Al Asad
• λ Leonis: Alterf
• μ Leonis: Ras Elased Borealis, Rasalas, Ras Al Asad Al Shamaliyy, Alshemali
• ο Leonis: Subra

Deep-Sky Object Descriptions

Mythology and History

It is very likely that this is the lion from the Herakles saga, which he mastered in his first task, which Eurysteus asked him to do.

The lovely landscape of Nemea lies on the southern Greek peninsula of Peloponnese. A particularly dangerous beast lived there: a lion with a skin hard as steel, yet supple. His terrible claws sharp and hard as diamond. This lion was also not easy to catch and kill, because it lived in a cave with two escape routes. Heracles' arrows could not hurt him and all his weapons failed. In order to prevent the lion from escaping, Heracles blocked the second escape route of the cave and, penetrating from the front, he finally strangled him with his bare hands. His knife could not even penetrate the dead lion's body and so he had to use the diamond-hard claws to peel off the lion's fur. Heracles put his skin over his shoulders and wore it like armor.

The lion was the son of Echidne and Orthos. Echidne was a beautiful woman, but only halfway; from there her body continued as a spotty snake. Orthos was Echidnes fathered with Typhon and was a dog with two heads. The lion's sister is the famous Sphinx.

The lion as a constellation is therefore also called Nemean Leo, Nemeaeus, Nemeaeum Monstrum and Hercules Leo. In Persia it is called Ser or Shir, in Turkey Artan, in Syria Aryo and in Babylonia Aru; this word always means a lion. In the attempt to Christianize he was changed into Daniel's lion or - ridiculous as it may sound - into the unbelieving Thomas. ^{[20, 67]}