Ursa Major: The End is Near
**This is an image of what Ursa Major looked like in the night sky.
If you look closely you will see Ursa Minor sitting close by.**
Well, my blue majestic rock was down to its last crumble. I was not sure how I would get back home if I used my last request to travel to another place in time; so to be on the safe side, I decided to head home. Holding my blue rock in one hand and the lyre from Orpheus in the other I said, “Take me home.” In a flash I was back in the comfort of my own bedroom. I quickly went to my dresser and removed the wooden box I inherited from Ptolemy, as Perseus from my second trip suggested. To my surprise, the bottom of the box slid right off, just as Perseus said it would. “How could I have overlooked this all these years? I have spent many a lonely night staring at this box,” I wondered.
Two small pieces of paper fell out as I removed the bottom. The first piece of paper had two bears drawn at the top: one appeared to be Ursa Major and the other Ursa Minor, the "Greater Bear" and the "lesser bear". Below it was text that appeared to be Greek. I recognized the word Callisto and immediately knew the paper was about Ursa Major. I went to my computer and used a free translator service to translate the paper and here is what it said:
“Callisto was a beautiful maiden which is why Jupiter fell in love with her at first sight. Jupiter knew he must have her even if only once, so he followed her in the woods and had his way with her. Nine months later, Callisto gave birth to a baby boy named Arcas. Juno, the wife of Jupiter, caught wind of his infidelity and became enraged with jealousy. She decided to punish Callisto by turning her into a bear.
Arcas never knew what happened to his mother but was adopted by a loving family and grew up to be a strong hunter. One day while hunting in the woods, Arcas stumbled across Callisto. She temporarily forgot she was a bear and went to hug Arcas. Of course, Arcas thought he was being attacked by a bear so he raised his arrow to kill Callisto. Jupiter saw this happening and decided to spare Arcas and Callisto from this terrible fate. He turned Arcas into a small bear and then grabbed them by their tails and threw them into the heavens so they could be together forever. It is rumored that the strength of Jupiter's throw was so powerful it elongated their short, stubby tails.”
I had no idea what significance this had but then I remembered there was a second sheet of paper. Again, I used the online language translator. The results were confusing a first but then I realized it was a key. Callisto, Jupiter, Juno, and Arcas were code names for different numbers. When I compared these numbers to the formulas on the lyre, they matched. It seemed the documents were a back-up copy to the information on the lyre.
I knew that paper could easily be carbon-dated which would place the formulas not only in Ptolemy's handwriting but also during his lifetime. Combining this with the exact method of calculation found on the lyre, I have more than enough to prove that Ptolemy's work is original and not copied from Hipparchus.
I headed off to stop Hipparchus' descendant, Marx, from receiving the nomination as the president's chief science advisor.
Author's
Note: Ursa Major is a fairly short story. Maple is the
character I created and she plays an active role in this story.
The only part of this story that is part of the original Ursa Major
mythology is the paragraph that tells about Maple's first Greek
translation from the online service. I kept that story intact
and did not change any of the original information. It should be
noted there are a few different versions of the Roman Ursa Major story
and the one I used is in the image information section at the bottom of
this page. The remainder of the story on this page are part of my
frametale. I tried to actively combine the original mythology
story with the frametale I created.
Bibliography:
Title: Ursa Major
Websource: Ursa major
* Image Information
Title: Ursa Major
Websource: Ursa Major
