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In Greek mythology, the Seven Sisters are named after the Pleiades, who were
the daughters of Atlas and Pleione. Their father, Atlas, was forced to hold up the sky,
and was therefore unable to protect his daughters. But to save them from being
raped by Orion the hunter, Zeus transformed them into stars. Orion was the son of
Poseidon, the King of the sea, and a Cretan princess. Orion first appears in ancient
Greek calendars (e.g. Planeaux, 2006), but by the late eighth to early seventh centuries BC, he is said to be making unwanted advances on the Pleiades (Hesiod, Works
and Days, 618–623).
Curiously, similar stories about the Pleiades and Orion are told in Aboriginal
Australia. For example, most Aboriginal cultures associate Orion with a hunter, or a
young man, or a group of young men, or a male ceremony, and many have stories in
which the men in Orion are trying to chase and rape the girls of the Pleiades (e.g.
Massola, 1968; Mountford, 1939, 1976). The similarity between the Aboriginal and
Greek stories of the Pleiades and Orion includes three specific elements: both identify the Pleiades as a group of young girls, both identify Orion as male, and both say
that Orion is attempting to have sex with the girls in the Pleiades.
These strong similarities suggest a common origin, which appears to predate
European contact with Aboriginal Australia.
This comparison is particularly interesting because there has been almost no
cultural contact between the European (i.e. Greek) and Aboriginal Australian cultures from about 100,000 BC, when the ancestors of both cultures migrated out of
Africa, until 1788 when the British invaded Australia. Nevertheless, there is a
remarkable similarity between the stories in both cultures. Norris and Norris (2009)
first suggested that one explanation for this similarity is that the roots of the Seven
Sisters story could date back to 100,000 BC, thus providing a common ancestry for
this story in all modern human cultures. This paper examines this “Out of Africa”
hypothesis.
A related puzzle concerns the number of stars in the Pleiades. Although, in
principle, ten stars in the Pleiades are sufficiently bright (mv < 6) to be seen with the
naked eye, most people with good eyesight, in a dark sky, see only six stars (Kyselka,
1993). This is not a new phenomenon: even in the third century BC, the Greek poet
Aratos of Soli gave the names of the Seven Sisters (Halcyone, Merope, Celaeno,
Electra, Sterope, Taygete, and Maia) but then reported that “only six are visible to
the eyes” (Krupp, 1991). Thus, while many cultures regard the cluster as having
seven stars, they acknowledge that only six are normally visible, and then have a
story to explain why the seventh is invisible.
These “lost Pleiad” stories are found in European, African, Asian, Indonesian,
Native American and Aboriginal Australian cultures (Burnham Jr., 1978; Gibson,
2017). In Greek mythology, one of the sisters, Merope, was ashamed of falling in
love with a mortal and therefore faded from sight (Sparavigna, 2008). In Australian
Aboriginal mythology, one (or occasionally two) of the sisters has died, is hiding, is
too young, or has been abducted, so only six (or five) are visible (Fuller, Norris, &
Trudgett, 2014; Kyselka, 1993). Krupp (1991) gives a story from the Onondaga
Iroquois in which one of the stars sang as they ascended to the sky and thus became
fainter. In Islam, the seventh star fell to earth and became the Great Mosque
R. P. Norris and B. R. M. Norris
In Greek mythology, the Seven Sisters are named after the Pleiades, who were
the daughters of Atlas and Pleione. Their father, Atlas, was forced to hold up the sky,
and was therefore unable to protect his daughters. But to save them from being
raped by Orion the hunter, Zeus transformed them into stars. Orion was the son of
Poseidon, the King of the sea, and a Cretan princess. Orion first appears in ancient
Greek calendars (e.g. Planeaux, 2006), but by the late eighth to early seventh centuries BC, he is said to be making unwanted advances on the Pleiades (Hesiod, Works
and Days, 618–623).
Curiously, similar stories about the Pleiades and Orion are told in Aboriginal
Australia. For example, most Aboriginal cultures associate Orion with a hunter, or a
young man, or a group of young men, or a male ceremony, and many have stories in
which the men in Orion are trying to chase and rape the girls of the Pleiades (e.g.
Massola, 1968; Mountford, 1939, 1976). The similarity between the Aboriginal and
Greek stories of the Pleiades and Orion includes three specific elements: both identify the Pleiades as a group of young girls, both identify Orion as male, and both say
that Orion is attempting to have sex with the girls in the Pleiades.
These strong similarities suggest a common origin, which appears to predate
European contact with Aboriginal Australia.
This comparison is particularly interesting because there has been almost no
cultural contact between the European (i.e. Greek) and Aboriginal Australian cultures from about 100,000 BC, when the ancestors of both cultures migrated out of
Africa, until 1788 when the British invaded Australia. Nevertheless, there is a
remarkable similarity between the stories in both cultures. Norris and Norris (2009)
first suggested that one explanation for this similarity is that the roots of the Seven
Sisters story could date back to 100,000 BC, thus providing a common ancestry for
this story in all modern human cultures. This paper examines this “Out of Africa”
hypothesis.
A related puzzle concerns the number of stars in the Pleiades. Although, in
principle, ten stars in the Pleiades are sufficiently bright (mv < 6) to be seen with the
naked eye, most people with good eyesight, in a dark sky, see only six stars (Kyselka,
1993). This is not a new phenomenon: even in the third century BC, the Greek poet
Aratos of Soli gave the names of the Seven Sisters (Halcyone, Merope, Celaeno,
Electra, Sterope, Taygete, and Maia) but then reported that “only six are visible to
the eyes” (Krupp, 1991). Thus, while many cultures regard the cluster as having
seven stars, they acknowledge that only six are normally visible, and then have a
story to explain why the seventh is invisible.
These “lost Pleiad” stories are found in European, African, Asian, Indonesian,
Native American and Aboriginal Australian cultures (Burnham Jr., 1978; Gibson,
2017). In Greek mythology, one of the sisters, Merope, was ashamed of falling in
love with a mortal and therefore faded from sight (Sparavigna, 2008). In Australian
Aboriginal mythology, one (or occasionally two) of the sisters has died, is hiding, is
too young, or has been abducted, so only six (or five) are visible (Fuller, Norris, &
Trudgett, 2014; Kyselka, 1993). Krupp (1991) gives a story from the Onondaga
Iroquois in which one of the stars sang as they ascended to the sky and thus became
fainter. In Islam, the seventh star fell to earth and became the Great Mosque
R. P. Norris and B. R. M. Norris