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Midsummer is coming soon. No leap month this year, but check out the Big Dipper just before dawn. Where is it? For more, I have been writing about the Nebra Sky Disk on substack. open.substack.com/pub/dcwalley...

That's a wrap, but the dish of circumpolar stars that never set, including the "BigDipper", continues turning to get far away from the skies we have been watching. The spoon reaches North at midsummer, when we wish we could have an extra month.

#HappyYule. It's the big night. Those in the know are expecting bad news, but hey, it's a party out there. Go look! #astronomy #archeoastronomy #lunarCalendar #lunar #leapMonth

There is a breed of #LittleDog known for 2 things - a bark that sounds like a laugh, and a habit of staring. #CanisMinor stares at the area between #Taurus and #Gemini - defining a good line for judging whether the #Moon reaches Gemini or not. #astronomy #archeaoastronomy #Yule #lunarCalendar

Happy #Yule! Tonight is a great night for watching the cow jump #OverTheMoon, and for watching #Vega of the fiddle, swoop along the horizon at true North. Kiss someone when Vega kisses the horizon - at #midnight. #stargazing #HeyDiddleDiddle #astronomy #archaeoastronomy

The #Moon is headed for #Taurus, #Gemini and #Leo, because they are all along the #ecliptic - the Sun's path. We cannot see which #zodiac #constellation the #Sun is in because it is too bright, but we know the Moon is opposite in the zodiac when it is full. #HeyDiddleDiddle #stargazing #astronomy

Happy #Yule! If you watch carefully, you can see stars disappear behind the #Moon. Therefore, early #astronomers thought the Moon divided the Earth below from the heavens and #CelestialSphere with the stars and constellations "over the Moon".

Happy Yule! A "lunatic" used to be someone who used the #Moon as their #calendar. In an early smear campaign, they were successfully deemed to be crazy. Call me crazy, I like star-gazing and tracking the Moon. #astronomy #Stonehenge #stargazing #Yule

Call it a half-moon or first-quarter moon, tonight is a good night to check out the moon, and start a count to the full Moon and Yule. Maceo the polar bear astronomer has a lot to say over the next few nights, about the most fascinating object in the night sky.

Getting closer to the big Yule party, the cow is sizing up the Moon. Look for the Seven Sisters cluster, and use it to track the Moon over the next few nights.

Happy fifth night of the Moon before Yule. Vega, the "harp star", is brighter than anything in the northwest sky. If seen from the same latitude as Stonehenge, it swoops by and kisses the North horizon, as it traces the rim of the dish of stars that never set.

Happy Moon before Yule from Leo the cat. Leo rises while Lyra the fiddle drops, as our polar bear astronomer approaches midnight.

"Diddle" used to mean "toddle" or "toddler". What were you thinking? Diddle Diddle could mean the twin Gemini toddlers. Stay tuned, there's more.

Hey, Hi, High - could be a word lost in time, or a pun to get you to look up. Happy Yule. Share the word.

Tonight is the first night of the lunar month "Moon before Yule", and the best time of year to view the constellations of the rhyme "High Diddle Diddle". Look up for 14 nights, and then join the big party!

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 25 – “King tide” is a modern term, but has always happened when spring tides coincide with the #Moon at perigee - its closest to Earth. It is gaining use as coastal flooding becomes a global issue. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 24 – Bronze Age astronomers would notice occasional novae – new stars. There is one visible in the constellation Lupus, but it is barely bright enough to detect with the naked eye. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 23 – The Milky Way is visible in summer, but dark sky is needed. Some cultures see birds in its pattern, and it is roughly in the direction of bird migrations, leading to the name ‘the Birds Path’. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 22 – The newspaper stories of the Great Moon Hoax of 1835 may be plagiarism of an Edgar Allen Poe tale. Poe’s was obviously tongue-in-cheek, but the Hoax fooled many more readers. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 21 – We imagine looking down on maps, but star charts are meant to be held aloft and viewed while looking up, so East and West are opposite where many people expect them to be. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 20 – Tonight the Sun sets and then rises further north than on any other night of the year. While well-know to ancient astronomers, it was not the basis of most calendars – the Moon was. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 19 – Janis Joplin’s ‘Half #Moon’ was on her ‘Pearl’ album, released posthumously in 1971. The album was at the top of the Billboard charts for nine weeks. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 18 – When the #Moon is half-illuminated, the phase is ‘first-quarter’ or ‘third-quarter’ moon. The word ‘moon’ refers to the #lunar month. Look for imperfections along the lunar terminator tonight. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 17 – #Regulus means the little king, and is also known as the heart of the lion. Important in early astronomy because it is bright and close to the ecliptic. It will soon disappear for the summer months. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 16 – In ancient Greek mythology, Selene was the goddess and personification of the Moon. She was depicted driving a chariot with one or two horses, sometimes with wings. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 15 – Chinese astronomer Gan De may have seen a #moon of Jupiter in -354. A fragment of his work describing an observation, could be about Ganymede or Callisto, centuries before Galileo. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 14 – The arc on the #NebraSkyDisc looks more like a protractor than a boat. It traces the path of a circumpolar star, with ticks showing the celestial sphere's movement from one midnight to the next. #Moon #BronzeAge #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 13 – Selenography is the study of the physical features and surface of the #Moon. It is at least as old as Democratis, who claimed in year -449 that mountains and valleys caused what we see. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 12 – Tatum O’Neal won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1973 for playing Addie in Paper Moon. At age 10, she was the youngest winner in Oscar history, and remains so today. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 11 – Nocturnal hunting is affected by the #Moon’s phase and light it provides. As science is learning, this affects prey behaviour, including timing of births in cattle domesticated in the #BronzeAge. #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 10 – As seen from some parts of the world, the #Moon occults Antares. From Nebra, the two move apart. Antares has a reddish hue and irregular changes in brightness. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 9 – Different cultures see different things in the #Moon's patterns of light and dark, including a rabbit or two. Moon rabbits feature in folklores of China, Indigenous America, India, and more. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 8 – Seeing #Mercury is difficult under ideal conditions, and impossible in much of the modern world. If you find a good view, about a half hour after sunset, #Jupiter is nearby. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #Lunar

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 7 – Knowth, in County Meath, Ireland, is a large burial complex containing many examples of megalithic art, including the oldest depiction of the #Moon’s surface. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera #stargazing #LunarCalendar #HeyDiddleDiddle

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 6 – #Spica and the #Moon are close together for most of us, but because of parallax - viewing from different angles - you can see an total occultation if you are a penguin, very far south of India. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 5 – #BrunoMars released “Talking to the #Moon” in 2010, on his debut EP. A slow ballad with lush production, it met with mixed reviews. A TV serial drama helped it reach #1 in Brazil. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 4 – We see the #lunar terminator through the Mare Imbrium, the Sea of Storms, and Mare Nubrium, the Sea of Clouds. Copernicus Crater splits the two. We would see a very slow sunrise if we were on the #Moon. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 3 – There are several reports from history, of flashes on the #Moon, notably from five monks in 1178. Long disputed, modern intruments are recording flashes, supporting the monks. #BronzeAge #astronomy #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #Antikythera #stargazing

#Nightly #Lunascope Jun 2 – A large gear on the front of the #Antikythera mechanism is incomplete, but analysis suggests it had 354 teeth. Most #LunarCalendars alternate between 29 and 30-day months, so 12 months ends up being 354 days. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology

#Nightly @Lunascope Jun 1 – The #Moon is between Mars, the god of war, and #Regulus, the heart of the lion and “little king”. As a bright star close to the ecliptic, Regulus was a common subject of #BronzeAge observations and records. #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera

#Nightly @Lunascope May 31 – The morning star #Venus is near its greatest apparent distance from the Sun. This makes it surprisingly bright enough to be seen in daylight, and the cause of numerous #UFO reports. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera

#Nightly @Lunascope May 30 – The Cult of #Mithras competed with early Christianity in the Roman Empire. It was based on levels of secret astronomical knowledge, probably including the precession of the equinoxes. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #archeoastronomy #astrology #Antikythera

#Nightly #Lunascope May 29 – After the hit ‘Fly Me to the #Moon’, Frank followed up with the 1966 Moon-themed album ‘Moonlight Sinatra’. Excitement about the space program helped it to #38 on the Billboard album chart. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #LunarCalendar #archaeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing

#Nightly #Lunascope May 28 – The #Moon and #Jupiter are visible just after sunset. As king of the gods in Roman #mythology, many things were named after him, but not the planet – the planet was the god, the god was the planet. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #LunarCalendar #archaeoastronomy #stargazing

#Nightly #Lunascope May 27 – The Antikythera mechanism includes a spiral indicator showing the Metonic cycle. After completing one 19-year cycle, the #Moon, Sun and Earth return to close to the same relative positions. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #LunarCalendar #archaeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing

Night Tonight - May 27/28. 24 hours per minute.

#Nightly #Lunascope May 26 – Most of High Diddle Diddle happens in the South near midwinter. The circumpolar Dish has turned and the big Spoon is running away North, but fades before getting there. Keep watching. #Moon #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #LunarCalendar #archaeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing

#Nightly #Lunascope May 25 – The brightness of #Venus depends on its distance, and the phase we see. When close to quarter phase it is brightest. With no #Moon, it is the brightest thing all night, rising before dawn. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #LunarCalendar #archaeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing

#Nightly #Lunascope May 24 – King tides occur when the #Moon and Sun align, and the #Moon is closer than usual in its elliptical orbit. Preparing for these tides is critical in coastal areas as sea levels rise. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #LunarCalendar #archaeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing

#Nightly #Lunascope May 23 – Libration, the change in the orientation of the #Moon as seen from Earth, means there are places on the #lunar surface where #Earthrise can be seen. The famous photo was taken from orbit. #BronzeAge #NebraSkyDisc #LunarCalendar #archaeoastronomy #astrology #stargazing