Wednesday, June 15, 2022 Wairarapa Midweek
FEATURE SUPPLEMENT
Space is fascinating. Stars just as much. Matariki especially.
2022 Matariki The Matariki star cluster rises in the morning sky on the eastern horizon, before the sun. This signals the beginning of Te M˜ tahi o te Tau or the M˜ori Ne w Year.
Matariki is always special and this year it is particularly so.
This year - 2022 - marks o˜ cial recognition for the ÿ rst time of Matariki with a designated public holiday on Friday 24 June. It celebrates the reappearance of the constellation of the stars by having a day dedicated to Remembrance and Rejuvenation. The pre-dawn rising of Matariki in the midwinter sky marks the changing of the seasons and the beginning of the M˛ori New Year. Historically, Matariki was celebrated during the last quarter of the moon of the lunar month Pipiri (around June); the ceremony involved viewing the individual stars for forecasts of the year to come, mourning the deceased of the past year, and making an o˝ ering of food to replenish the stars.
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Children celebrate Matariki in 2021, at the light show on the park island at Queen Elizabeth Park.
Ah, the night sky! There’s something magical about gazing into the darknessand looking at the stars.
Mankind has had a relationship with the stars since time began. Philosophers have marvelled over their existence. Gardeners have planted by them, mariners have sailed by them and civilisations have risen and fallen, based on their entire existence, and cultural rituals. Egyptians aligned their pyramids and temples towards the north because they believed their pharaohs became stars in the northern sky after they died. The ancient Maya were avid astronomers, recording and interpreting every aspect of the sky. They believed that the will and actions of the Gods could be read in the stars, moon, and planets. Many of their prominent buildings were built with astronomy in mind. One of artist and inventor Leonardo da Vinci’s most well-known astronomical discoveries resulted from his gazing at
the moon and stars. He was fascinated that even during crescent and new moon phases, the remainder of the moon could still be faintly seen. He pieced together that this was due to sunlight hitting the Earth and re˜ ecting on to the moon, giving it a noticeable glow, which he entitled ‘Earth shine’, others calling it the Da Vinci Glow.
Then there were the Wise Men who followed the stars to the birth of Jesus Christ and in today’s world, companies like Speights have leveraged such legends, and placed stars on their beer branding hoping that advertising slogans like “wise men have always followed the stars” will help them to sell more beer. In 1953, ÿ ve Japanese car companies merged to form Fuji Heavy Industries and adopted a cluster of stars as its o˛ cial logo. This cluster of stars is better known by the Greek name ‘Pleiades’ which is part of the Taurus constellation. CONTINUED ON PAGE 22