The Return of the Dog Days

Once again, we enter the Dog Days of summer. These 40 days of especially hot and humid weather often have little rainfall, but here in the Paradelle Northeast of the U.S. we have been getting a lot of rain with our 90+ degree days and humidity.

The ancient Greeks believed that Sirius, the “dog star” was rising with the Sun at this time was adding to the Sun’s heat. After all, since Sirius is the brightest star in the sky, they assumed it would be a second Sun and give off heat like our nearest star.

Sirius is called the Dog Star because it’s part of the constellation Canis Major (Greater Dog).  Sirius means sparkling or scorching which is certainly what it seemed like to early astronomers. Sirius is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star.

Those ancients also believed that the weather made dogs go mad. The Romans unfortunately tried to appease Sirius by sacrificing a brown dog at the start of the Dog Days.

Ancient Egyptians saw this time of Sirius arriving with the Sun as the beginning of the Nile’s flooding season. It was also their time for New Year celebrations.

“Dog Days” has become in modern times a term for any period of stagnation or inactivity. Wall Street marks this period as a generally slow and sluggish time for the markets (though earnings do create some heat).

via Etsy

Welcome to the Dog Days

Summer is less than a month old, but today is the beginning of the Dog Days of summer.

Those days run for 40 days and are generally known as especially hot and humid weather with little rainfall. It’s the kind of weather that makes us feel a bit sluggish. It’s a time when we might want to have  bit of a dog’s life and just finding a nice shady spot to take a nap.

It was the ancient Greeks that gave it that tag because they believed that Sirius, the “dog star,” was making the sun hotter.  That quite visible star rises now with the sun and they assumed it was like a second sun.

The ancients also thought this was a period when dogs were more likely to go mad and have fits. Unfortunately, the Romans tried to appease Sirius by sacrificing a brown dog at the start of the Dog Days.

Nowadays, “Dog Days” is less of a weather term and more of a general term meaning any period of stagnation or inactivity. For example Wall Street marks this period as one that tends to be slow and sluggish.

The August Dog Day’s Moon

Last year, there were two full Moons in August, so the second was a “Blue Moon.” That’s not true this year.

There are many names for this month’s Moon and usually I like to choose a different one each year. It could be the Grain Moon, Green Corn Moon, Red Moon (for the reddish hue it often takes on in the summer haze), Mating Moon, Woodcutter’s Moon, Chokeberry Moon, Summertime Moon, Corn Moon, Barley Moon, Dispute Moon, or the Moon When Cherries Turn Black.

I decided to go with the Dog Day’s Moon which refers to the phrase “dog days” a fairly common name for the sultry days of later summer. In the Northern Hemisphere, the dog days of summer are in July and August. In the Southern Hemisphere, they typically occur in January and February, in the midst of the austral summer.

Canis Major constellation map (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This name goes back to the ancient Romans who tagged the diēs caniculārēs (dog days) as those hot days that occur along with the star Sirius. Sirius was known as the “Dog Star” because it is the brightest star in the constellation Canis Major (Large Dog). Sirius is also the brightest star in the night sky. The term “Dog Days” was used even earlier by the Greeks.

The Dog Days originally were the days when Sirius rose just before or at the same time as sunrise (heliacal rising), which is no longer true, owing to precession of the equinoxes. In Ancient Rome, the Dog Days ran from July 23/24 through August 23/24.

The Romans sacrificed a red dog in April to appease Sirius, believing that the star was the cause of the sultry weather. Dog Days were popularly believed to be an evil time “the Sea boiled, the Wine turned sour, Dogs grew mad, and all other creatures became languid; causing to man, among other diseases, burning fevers, hysterics, and phrensies.” according to Brady’s Clavis Calendaria (1813).

The ancient Greeks observed that the appearance of Sirius heralded the hot and dry summer, and feared that it caused plants to wilt, men to weaken, and women to become aroused.Due to its brightness, Sirius would have been noted to twinkle more in the unsettled weather conditions of early summer. To Greek observers, this signified certain emanations which caused its malignant influence. Anyone suffering its effects was said to be astroboletos or “star-struck.”

The Old Farmer’s Almanac lists the traditional period of the Dog Days as the 40 days beginning July 3rd and ending August 11th, coinciding with the ancient heliacal (at sunrise) rising of Sirius.

 

The Dog Days of Summer

Welcome to the dog days of summer, the days of especially hot and humid weather with little rainfall.

The name comes from the ancient Greeks. They believed that Sirius, the “dog star,” which rose along with the sun at this time of the year, was adding to the sun’s heat. They also believed that the weather made dogs go mad.

“Dog Days” (Latin: diēs caniculārēs) are the hottest, most sultry days of summer. In the northern hemisphere, they usually fall between early July and early September. (Not to forget our southern hemisphere friends – there it is usually between January and early March.)  The days will vary from place to place because of latitude and climate.  The general definition of the Dog Days is a time period that is very hot or stagnant, or marked by dull lack of progress.

Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. It is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star. The name “Sirius” is derived from the Ancient Greek Σείριος Seirios (“glowing” or “scorcher”). What we see with the naked eye as a single star is actually a binary star system (a white main sequence star – Sirius A – and a faint white dwarf companion – Sirius B).

The Romans tried to appease Sirius by sacrificing a brown dog at the start of the dog days.

The Egyptians marked the arrival of dog days as the beginning of the Nile’s flooding season, as well as their New Year celebrations.

The modern French term for both this summer period (and for heat waves in general) “canicule“, derives from this same term.  It means “little dog”, again referring to Sirius.

Icelanders refer to the Danish adventurer Jørgen Jürgensen as Jörundur hundadagakonungur (“Jørgen the dog-days King” in Icelandic).

“Dog days” has been adopted by the American stock market, because the markets tend to be slow and sluggish during these summer months, as a period of stagnation or inactivity.

There are many popular culture references to Dog Days. Perhaps the best known is Dog Day Afternoon, the1975 film directed by Sidney Lumet, with Al Pacino and John Cazale in which a bank robbery goes a bit mad during a hot NYC afternoon.