Search out one of the very oldest recognised constellations this week. Taurus – the bull of heaven – was first recorded by the Babylonians in about 1000BC but other cultures may have associated this grouping of stars with a bull much earlier. At the Lascaux network of caves, in France, 17,000-year-old cave art shows what appears to be similar patterns to the stars of Taurus surrounded by a magnificent rendition of a bull.
Taurus is a zodiacal constellation, meaning that the sun’s path through the sky passes through its boundaries. Preceding Taurus on the zodiac is Aries, the ram, and following it is Cancer, the crab.
The charts shows the view looking east from London at 8pm GMT this week. The brightest star in Taurus is Aldebaran. The name means “eye of the bull” in Arabic. It is an enormous red giant star and shines with a distinctly orange hue. A V-shaped collection of stars marks the rest of the bull’s face. Above the bull’s shoulder sits the easily recognised star cluster called the Pleiades, or the seven sisters.
Taurus is also visible from the southern hemisphere, where it can be seen at this time of year quite low in the north-eastern sky at about 11pm local time.