One of the major beauties of the summer sky dangles in the northeast this evening like a piece of cosmic jewelry – the constellation Lyra. Its brightest star is Vega – the fifth-brightest star in the night sky. It sparkles like the diamond stud in an earring. The rest of Lyra hangs to its lower right like the rest of the earring. It forms a parallelogram – a slanted rectangle. Under fairly dark skies, it’s easy to see.

Lyra represents a lyre – a small harp. In skylore, it was sometimes shown being held by a large bird – an eagle or vulture. In fact, the name “Vega” comes from an Arabic phrase that means “the falling eagle.” But mainly the lyre was associated with the story of Orpheus.

His music was legendary. When he accompanied Jason and the Argonauts, his playing silenced the Sirens – evil creatures who lured sailors to their doom.

Orpheus married Eurydice. But she was bitten by a snake and died. Orpheus begged Hades, the god of the underworld, to let Eurydice return to him. His music was so beautiful that Hades agreed. But there was one condition: Orpheus couldn’t look back until they were outside. But he couldn’t resist – he looked too soon, and Eurydice vanished into the underworld forever.

Orpheus was heart-broken. He roamed aimlessly across the countryside, playing sad but beautiful music on his lyre – an instrument commemorated in the stars.

We’ll have more about Vega tomorrow.

Script by Damond Benningfield