The Origin of Ancient Star Groups
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According to Slavonic mythology the stars are regarded as living in habitual intercourse with men and their affairs.
An ancient legend was that there were no stars till the giants of old, throwing stones at the sun, pierced holes in the sky, and let the light of that orb shine through the holes which we call stars,—and Anaximenes thought that the stars were fixed in the dome of heaven like nails.
Thus we find, as some one has put it, that "astronomy like a golden thread runs through history and binds together all tribes and peoples of the earth," and the girdle of stars we view nightly remains as the most ancient monument of the work of intelligent man, "the oldest picture book of all."
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