Named after the bird that carried Zeus’s thunderbolt, the constellation hosts Altair, visible with the naked eye
This week affords us a great view of the constellation Aquila, the Eagle. According to Greek mythology, Aquila is the bird that carried Zeus’s thunderbolt (or Jupiter’s, if you prefer Roman mythology).
It is one of the 48 constellations originally recorded by the astronomer Ptolemy in the second century, and now forms one of the International Astronomical Union’s (IAU) officially recognised 88 constellations.
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