Orion is one of the most venerated constellations in human history. It’s not surprising why it has been worshipped for millennia. It’s one of the few constellations that can be seen from just about anywhere in the world, as well as one of the brightest. It is 90,000 times more luminous than the Sun.

Orion is most visible in the Northern Hemisphere from November to March, along with its immediate neighbors, Taurus and Gemini. Orion is the Greek name for the constellation, but it has many other names throughout the globe. The Sumerian Gilgamesh, the Babylonian god Marduh, the ancient Egyptian Sah, who would later be known as Osiris, the Norse god Odin, the Mayan Hunhunahpo and the Armenian god Hayk are a few worth mentioning.

The image of a man raising an arm in an act of violence, either holding a shield or even a bow and arrow, makes sense because of its proximity to Taurus, the bull. This storyline was consistent in many languages, yet there are interesting variations.

In an ancient cave in Lascaux, France, paintings were discovered along the walls dated roughly 17,000 years ago. In the “Hall of Bulls” there is a depiction of a bull amidst the constellations of Orion, Taurus and The Pleiades. Spain also has ancient cave paintings displaying similar scenes, which is not surprising since bullfighting is still a popular sport there.

Indo-Europeans in what is now known as The Balkans (modern Croatia) were living at about 45 degrees north, which made the variable position of the Sun useful for navigation during different seasons. Orion’s belt disappeared under the horizon at the spring equinox, which marked the beginning of a new year. Without clocks, Orion’s belt served as a key time signature. These Indo-Europeans, the Vucedol people, based their yearly calendar around Orion, which was the first ever found in Europe, dating around 2600BCE.

The Vucedol civilization coincides with Egypt’s semi-official beginnings – somewhere around 3000BCE. This was about 300 years after the Bronze Age began. Seafarers travelled all over the globe in search of copper to make Bronze. The oral sharing of traditions and creation myths is likely the reason why so many are strikingly similar. Humans were traveling by ship quite a bit during this era.

The Egyptian pyramids were built roughly between 2550 BCE and 2490BCE. Writer Robert Bauval posited, after many years of research, that the pyramids were intentionally aligned with Orion’s belt. That was the whole purpose of building the pyramids. It was an effort to catalyze a cosmic connection with the sky on Earth; to open a portal.

Egyptians had arguably the strongest connection to Orion compared to most cultures, although that is likely because they were the most prosperous. I really don’t have a clear understanding of how long ancient Egypt prospered. I’ve read that it started its decline in 2200BCE, but that was the peak of The Bronze Age, so a decline seems unlikely. Maybe a gradual decline. I imagine competing for copper became pretty ruthless, as others were also after it. Evidence was found on a Minoan ship dated around 2200 BCE that it had likely travelled to North America in search of copper.

The Egyptian concern with Orion had mostly to do with the flooding of the Nile. The heliacal rise of Orion and Sirius right around the summer solstice seemed directly connected to the level of water in the Nile. In a desert climate, for the Nile to flood during the summertime was mystifying to the Egyptians. Their survival depended on this flooding to be able to irrigate crops.

Egyptians observed that Orion and Sirius would disappear under the western horizon after sunset in late March and remain hidden for a period of about 3 months. They were lost in the “Underworld”.  At the summer solstice in late June, Orion and Sirius would emerge again in the eastern horizon just as the waters of the Nile began to rise. During this time in the Underworld, Egyptian astronomer-priests also observed that the Sun travelled along the ecliptic just below the constellation Leo and aligned with Orion and Sirius. They called this the “Duat”, which was like a “station of the cross”, allowing a rebirth of both the stars and the Nile.

While the Egyptians believed that the source of the Nile came from a cavernous region of the Underworld, in reality, the Nile floods during the summer because of monsoons in the Ethiopian highlands from May to August. These monsoons produce a tremendous amount of rain that flows downward along the many divergent paths of the Nile.

The myth of Osiris as the murdered king turned god is different from the Greek myth of Orion. Osiris is murdered by his envious brother then dismembered and buried in various spots across Egypt. Osiris’s wife, Isis, finds his remains and resurrects him from the dead long enough to become impregnated with his seed. Isis was the personification of the star Sirius.

Orion in Greek myth was a hunter who bragged to Artemis that he would kill every animal on Earth. Gaia was appalled by this and had Scorpius (a scorpion) murder Orion. There are several variations of the myth but it is interesting how the Greek tale is more about a cocky brute than a revered god. The legend was that Orion could hunt peacefully in the fall and winter, but he was chased out of the sky (or murdered) by Scorpio in the spring.

Now I didn’t research every Orion myth to write this post. What inspired my research is that I’m fascinated by how this Orion-Sirius star map relationship was copied by subsequent civilizations. Another interesting translation is the concept of the four corners (or the King of the Four Corners). I’ve always associated this with Native American traditions, but this idea dates back to ancient Sumer and the Akkadians.

I visited Chaco Canyon, New Mexico for the first time last fall.  It’s not easy to get to.  I was concerned that my worn out car with over 200,000 miles on it wasn’t going to make it. It was late October, so the weather was cold. That might have encouraged the haunted feeling I felt there. From what I’ve researched about Chaco, this wasn’t a place where most tribes lived throughout the year. They made the pilgrimage ceremonially, trekking from the four corners of the southwest to gather in spiritual communion.

One reason archaeologists determined that people didn’t live at Chaco full time is that there were no refuse middens. Any civilization, regardless of how many centuries have passed, would still have evidence of food and human waste remains. There were several indications that abandoning the settlement was intentional. Whether it was driven by drought or disharmony is not something we can determine. That information belongs to the surviving tribes of the American southwest.

It took about 700 years to build Chaco, lugging stone and giant timber for thousands of miles to a remote part of the desert. Researchers discovered solar alignments, as well as an alignment with Orion’s belt, in the design of the buildings. This was not knowledge they came up with out of thin air. Participants at Chaco thrived from the 9th to the 12th century CE, which was several thousand years after the ancient Egyptians.

The precession of the equinoxes has changed the timing of the heliacal rise of Orion and Sirius, peaking now around mid-August. This means that the United States forming on July 4th, 1776 was technically not a solar alliance with Sirius as the forefathers had predicted (read my post on “Sirius”).

The obsession with Orion and its mythical power cannot control the fate of a civilization. Whether or not Orion and Sirius are star gates might have more to do with dimensional time travel than power here on Earth, but their relevance in human consciousness is worth looking into. Is it only because they are some of the brightest, most visible stars in the night sky or is there something deeper involved?

It seems that the things in life that receive the most attention are the ones that appear the most obvious. Aligning with an image of a hunter doesn’t seem auspicious. A hunter who was murdered for his ruthlessness, no less. However, the story of Osiris distills in human consciousness the theme of death and resurrection; an endless feedback loop of endings and beginnings. Death and rebirth cycles are the simplified story of the Universe.

It isn’t just about Orion/Osiris, after all. The cycle cannot continue without the fertility of Sirius/Isis. The relationship between the two is more important than their singularity. If we see the Universe as having no linear progression, only feedback loops, then a sense of humility emerges. There are limits to power and growth. Shouldn’t there be? How else can the world regenerate without limits?