What's in the stars: CASSIOPEIA

Cassiopeia. A beautiful constellation of five stars. Usually, about half of the stars of a constellation are visible; a few stars shine bright and the others.. Well, you just have to accept that they're there. The Ursa Major is a good example of this; you only see the shape of a plough, or whatever you prefer to think it is. Cassiopeia, on the contrary.. You can see it in the city, on a balcony, not too close to a street light. All of its five stars, shining bright.
Cassiopeia, with its five stars, circles around the Polaris. Together they form the letter W. It could be that the W that stands for.. wreaking one's vengeance..

It all happened in a time when a young hero named Perseus roams around the cold and lonesome Atlas Mountains. There, between scary woods and rocky areas that have no ties with the inhabited world, he's put in touch with an unexplainable phenomenon. He runs into a lot of people, but all of them seem to be hollow, lifeless. Lifeless humans, lifeless animals. Everywhere on the field, there seem to be statues made out of stone. They are poor creatures, turned into stone by the woman with snakes for hair, Medusa. Medusa's face us truly ugly, horrifying. So horribly horrifying that when her glance meets your eyes, you are turned into stone.
Perseus encounters Medusa whilst wandering around the mountains, with only a bronze shield that reflects Medusa's petrifying glance. Like a mirror. Her own glance makes Medusa senseless, out cold.. This is the moment that.. Perseus slashes off her head! Perseus picks up the head, which covered in blood, and puts it in his bag, and flies off.. On a horse he flew.
Later on, with the horrifying head stored in his back, Cassiopeia's role in the story will be revealed.

Cassiopeia is looking at herself in the mirror, fully content. She is beautiful. In every room of her palace, she had her servants place a mirror. "I am beautiful, for I am the most beautiful." She knows. Right now, she is the queen.. so who would dare to oppose her? Her husband, Cepheus, most certainly wouldn't. He is the kind of king that doesn't really care about his queen.. He'd rather just let her do what she want. There are more important matters, such as sovereign matters.. As long as she won't do anything troublesome, it's okay.
Now I personally think that Cassiopeia might have been a treat for the eye, but there is no accounting for tastes; her vanity surpasses her beauty.

Cassiopeia is looking at her reflection in the mirror, obviously self-satisfied. "Beautiful, really beautiful, the most beautiful..". Because she is so unbelievable original.. she repeats what she's said before with different words. She always loudly announces that she is more beautiful than all of the fifty Nereids together. The Nereids, sea nymphs, all of them are beauties. They too have long hair, are admirable and young.
With that remark, "More beautiful than all the fifty Nereids togethers", she's done it. What she had just said was heard, and this time, by the nymphs themselves.. And it so happens to be that one of those fifty nymphs is married to Poseidon. "You won't have somebody tell you that a measly human is fifty times as beautiful as your own wife, wouldn't you, Poseidon?" Poseidon, the god of the sea, could not accept this as a fact, so there remains only one thing he can do.. he's going to wreak his vengeance. He sends a sea monster to Cassiopeia's kingdom. A monster with an upper body that covers a wide area of water, which makes the sea wild and unpredictable. With a truly gruesome face, like a dragon's. The animal will trouble the shores of Cassiopeia's kingdom, it will destroy them!

You would say that Cassiopeia and Cepheus don't have a chance, but they decide to see an oracle. The oracle tells them that there is only one thing they can do.. they will have to sacrifice their daughter, Andromeda, to the monster. Her parents took their innocent child to the shores and tied her to the rocks using chains. Her feet nearly touch the water, ready for the monster. She is naked, powerless.
Father and mother, both truly unhappy–the mother deserved it, though–are looking at it complaining. But well, it seems like they are convinced that only this sacrifice will calm the monster.

And who suddenly appears? Perseus. He sees Andromeda. If the wind hadn't blown through her hairs, he would've thought that she was a statue made out of marble. Carved out of the rocks. A beauty! He nearly forgets that he is flying on his horse now. Then he decides to land. "Who are you? Where are you from? Why ..?" She looks at the ground, as a young girl, she's a bit afraid to talk to a man, and if she wasn't chained to a rock, she would've covered her face with her hands out of embarrassment.
Tears start welling up in her eyes. 'What if he thinks this is my own fault..' She thought, so she decided to explain the story about her mother, her vanity, everything. "I don't think she meant it that way, but the nymphs don't like what she's said. And now.. I'm here and.. and I will…." The monster announces that it's near. Something of its size would easily be able to move there in only a few seconds, minutes at most. The girl screams.
Perseus thinks: 'This is the moment I'll have to do business.' He turns towards Cassiopeia and Cepheus. "If I add to all of my virtues one more, and heaven grants me the opportunity to save your daughter.. Will she be mine?" They agree, beg him to do so.

The monster travels through the water with high speed. Perseus takes off, straight up. So high that his shadow and the shadow of Medusa's head falls on the water's surface, right above the monster. The wild animal fights with that shadow, wants to bite. It hammers around its own body. It's confused. Especially when Perseus unsheathes his sword. He can barely stand on a place of reef that's covered with only a bit of water. It's just the right spot for Perseus to stab the animal about three, four times in its lower body. When he shows the animal the head of Medusa, and it looks into her eyes, even the giant monster.. this horrible beast.. also turns into stone and has become an island.. named Levant, we know that.
On the beach Perseus's upcoming parents in-law are jubilating, so loud that even the gods can hear it. Andromeda is free.. Andromeda is.. Perseus's. And Cassiopeia..?

Andromeda, the beautiful daughter, has managed to escape the vengeance. Perseus becomes her supporting husband. But Cassiopeia, the arrogant mother, does not escape her punishment. Poseidon and the nymphs exile her to the heavenly pole. She sits there, on her throne. Day by day, she brushes her hair. She circles around the Polaris. Sometimes she sits straight, then you read the letter m – sometimes she sits upside-down, and then you read the letter W, which stands for wreaking one's vengeance.

Cassiopeia also has had a sixth star at some point. Not for a really long time, but still. Two years to be precise. In the year 1572AD it appeared, and in 1574AD, it disappeared. It was called Al Alaaf. For centuries it was also called the pilgrim, or the stranger. We now know that it had been a supernova, a star that dies because of its old age and sends out a giant ray of light, which we can see here on the planet earth. At first there was a giant commotion because people thought it was the returning star of Bethlehem, announcing the comeback of Jezus Christ on earth.
Think about it. You're looking at the stars and suddenly you discover a new star. This is what happened to Tycho Brahe, and astronomer, on the 11th of August 1572 in Denmark. It made a giant impression on Tycho Brahe, he gave his life to the stars and because a grand astronomer. And, thanks to his notes, we know what happened to the sixth start of Cassiopeia.


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