.|left After Atlas was forced to carry the heavens on his shoulders,
Orion began to pursue all of the Pleiades, and Zeus transformed them first into doves, and then into stars to comfort their father. The
constellation of Orion is said to still pursue them across the night sky. One of the most memorable myths involving the Pleiades is the story of how these sisters literally became stars, their
catasterism. According to some versions of the tale, all seven sisters killed themselves because they were so saddened by either the fate of their father, Atlas, or the loss of their siblings, the Hyades. In turn, Zeus, the ruler of the Greek gods, immortalized the sisters by placing them in the sky. There these seven stars formed the star cluster known thereafter as the Pleiades. The Greek poet
Hesiod mentions the Pleiades several times in his
Works and Days. As the Pleiades are primarily winter stars, they feature prominently in the ancient agricultural calendar. Here is a bit of advice from Hesiod: The Pleiades would "flee mighty Orion and plunge into the misty deep" as they set in the West, which they would begin to do just before dawn during October–November, a good time of the year to lay up your ship after the fine summer weather and "remember to work the land"; in Mediterranean agriculture autumn is the time to plough and sow. The poet
Sappho mentions the Pleiades in one of her poems:The moon has goneThe Pleiades goneIn dead of nightTime passes onI lie aloneThe poet
Lord Tennyson mentions the Pleiades in his poem "
Locksley Hall":Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising through the mellow shade,Glitter like a swarm of
fire-flies tangled in a silver braid.The loss of one of the sisters, Merope, in some myths may reflect an astronomical event wherein one of the stars in the
Pleiades star cluster disappeared from view by the naked eye. == Alternative version ==