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Astronomy compels the soul to look upwards and leads us from this world to another.
– Plato

PISCES - Ἰχθύες
The Constellation of the Zodiac Pisces is depicted as two fish tethered together by a rope. Sitting between the constellations Aquarius and Aries, the sun makes it's way into Pisces in March, in the Northern celestial hemisphere.
It was once part of the Babylonian constellations, Šinunutu 'the great swallow' and Anunitum 'lady of heaven and later in the first millennium, the Rikis-nu.mi, "the fish cord or ribbon". The constellation Anunitum described above would tell a story of the return of the sun after the winter solstice with the myth of the Syrian Goddess, Atargatis. Atargatis was also known as Derceto - and later would be blended with Aphrodite in Greek mythology.
In this Babylonian myth two fish come upon a giant floating egg in the Euphrates river, which they guide to land. Once on land a dove appears and begins to brood the egg, until eventually Atargatis is born from it. Atargatis was thankful for the two fish and put them in the heavens as a reward.
Later, the Greeks would adapt these stories of the stars to tell their own mythos on the origins of the universe.
Pisces was indexed by the Greek astronomer Claudius Ptolemy in his work Almagest in the 2nd century CE. In Greek mythology the constellation is associated with the Gigantomacy, a tale of the battle of the Giants and the Olympian Gods over control of the cosmos.
The Story of Typhon -
Once upon a Greek myth there was Gaia, the Mother of the Earth and Giants. Gaia along with Tartarus (the abyss in which Zeus imprisoned the Titans) gave birth to Typhon in order to defeat the Olympian Gods. This huge, winged serpentine monster Typhon was said to be the deadliest monster the world had ever seen. A fearful dragon-like creature, from his shoulders grew the heads of a thousand snakes, eyes and mouths burning with fire, tongues flickering black. Each head screaming, growling and hissing a different terrifying sound. Gaia sent Typhon to kill the Gods.
Pan was the first to see Typhon coming and after alerting the other Gods, turned into a goat-fish and jumped into the Euphrates river. One of the myths represented by the constellation Capricornus.
Aphrodite and her son Eros ran and took cover in the leaves near the Euphrates river, growing fearful from the coming wind, Aphrodite called to the river nymphs for help. Aphrodite and Eros leapt into the river, turned into fish and swam away. In an alternate version of the myth Aphrodite and Eros leapt into the river and were carried away on the backs of two fish.
Aphrodite and Eros then became associated with the constellation Pisces.
Zeus eventually defeated Typhon with his thunderbolts and sent Typhon to the prison Tartarus, the dungeon of torment, to be divinely punished forever.


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