Aquila is Asian. But from which country? It doesn’t matter. The cultures are connected with depths of myths and legends. She is above the borders. She experienced the constraints and she knows that limits are introduced by the societies, not by nature. She is a Woman of the Universe.
LEGEND
The shape of Aquila constellation is defined by 8 bright stars, the brightest of them Altair. They outline the wings of a bird – an eagle.
The eagle is how ancient Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cultures portrayed it. Indian mythology pictures the stars to be the footprints of Vishnu, the god who guards humanity and the Universe.
In the mythologies of China, Japan and Korea the stories are related to the Summer Triangle defined by Aquila, Lyra and Cygnus constellations.
Altair, Aquila’s brightest star, represents a royal herdsman and Vega represents the Sun king. The herdsman falls in love with the king’s daughter and marries her. They are so much in love that they neglect their duties. For that, they are banished to opposite sides of a “river” (the Milky Way).
The lovers are allowed to reunite once a year, when birds span the river. The birds may have been inspired by the two bird-shaped constellations, Aquila and Cygnus, that appear in this area of the Milky Way.
This love story is to this day celebrated by a Japanese festival Tanabata, every year, on 7 July.
