The Fixed Stars

Tau Herculis

Unnamed, known by its Bayer letter. It stands at about 15° Scorpio (tropical).

A star that once held the still point of the turning sky, and will again.

Tau lies on the hero's lower leg, and it keeps one remarkable secret, around nine thousand years ago the slow wobble of the earth's axis made it the pole star, the pivot the whole sky turned upon. The wheel will bring the office back to it in a distant age. Little traditional astrological lore attaches to this star.

The former pole-star role is astronomical fact, not astrological tradition; no old delineation attaches.