The Dog Days of Summer

If the summer weather seems oppressively hot, what do you do? The ancient Greeks put the guilt on Sirius, the mythical dog of the hunter-turned-constellation Orion. The rising of the star Sirius in the sky seemed to, at best, forewarn of, or at worst, actually be the cause of the hot weather to come and the misfortune, illness, and catastrophe that might follow. These days were known as the “dog days” of summer.

Sirius Rising

When the star of Sirius is in the sky, it is the brightest of all the constellations, and it appears following Orion. Ancient cultures place its rise in the sky at different dates, though the most commonly accepted starting point is July 19th. The effects of Sirius were said to last from this mid-July date all the way until early August. Some argued that the actual worst days were those right before Sirius appeared, but most take Sirius showing up in the sky as the start of the “dog days” of summer.

An Evil Portent

These hottest days of summer were about more than just an unpleasant temperature. Superstition at the time also associated these days with lethargy, fever, thunderstorms, plants wilting, the weakness of men, wantonness of women, a higher likelihood of dogs getting rabies, and basically misfortune in general. Homer’s Iliad describes the “dog days” as such:

“Sirius rises late in the dark, liquid sky
On summer nights, star of stars,
Orion’s Dog they call it, brightest
Of all, but an evil portent, bringing heat
And fevers to suffering humanity.”

The association between this star, the hotness of summer, dogs, and disaster is even present in other cultures besides Greek. Ancient Romans called the star “Canicula”, or “little dog”. Geoffrey Chaucer, a famed writer and astronomer of the Middle Ages, depicted the star as having the head of a dog. Alternatively, Norse culture called this star “Lokabrenna”, meaning “Loki’s torch”. This association with the trickster god falls right in line with the chaos thought to come with the rise of Sirius in Greek mythology.

Whatever the Weather

While the ancient Greeks blamed Sirius for the hot weather as well as anything bad that might happen during the summer, the star actually has no scientific effect on the planet. It’s too far away. And whether or not the weather is actually hot depends a lot more on your location on Earth than where distant stars in the sky are located (excluding, of course, the Sun). As far as tips on how to survive the season go, staying out of the sun will probably help alleviate the heat more so than sacrificing a dog to Zeus, as some ancient Greeks did.