Shelley Parker, age 10, of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, for her question:
WHERE DID THE SIGNS OF THE ZODIAC COME FROM?
Twelve groups of stars form a band around the whole sphere of the sky. The groups are called constellations, a word that means star groups. Many centuries ago star gazers thought that all of these groups except one looked like animals, men or women, and they called the band the zodiac.
The word zodiac comes from the same Greek source as our word zoo, and the 12 groups of constellations in our sky are indeed like a collection from the menagerie.
The constellations of the zodiac are Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpius, Sagittarius, Capricornus, Aquarius and Pisces. Only Libra, the scale, isn't based on a living creature. Through this collection of stars pass our planets, the moon and sun.
Hipparchus, the great Greek astronomer, charted and divided the zodiac about 2,000 years ago. He came up with 12 divisions which he called signs and these signs receive the names we still use today.
Hipparchus noted, as astronomers had before him, that the sun stays, roughly, in one of these divisions during one month of the year. when astronomers in those days said that the sun was in a particular sign, he meant that it was in a certain constellation. He knew that it only seemed to move against a certain group of stars since it was known that the planets and the sun were much closer to earth than any of the stars.
Modern astronomers today do not use the signs for reference in scientific astronomy although the signs are still used by those who follow astrology. Millions of people today in various degrees of seriousness, feel that the zodiac sign of a person's birth has an effect on the way his life is patterned.
Different peoples of the world have developed their own signs or symbols for the zodiac through the centuries. The Chinese and Egyptians, for instance, have signs that are different from ours.
The Chinese zodiacal signs are completely different from ours, being based on rather common animals. Their collection of zoo creatures include the rat, ox, tiger, hare, dragon, serpent, horse, sheep, monkey, hen, dog and pig.
Most of the constellations picked out by star watchers around the world are seen in the form of animals.