The constellation Pisces can be seen from almost anywhere on Earth. Pisces has a long history and is one of the constellations of the zodiac, a set of star patterns that lie along the apparent path of the Sun across the sky throughout the year. The name “Pisces” comes from the Latin plural meaning “fish.”
Pisces used to be referred to as the first constellation of the zodiac. This is because the Sun appears against the backdrop of Pisces during the spring equinox in the northern hemisphere, which was once considered the beginning of a new year.
How to find Pisces
The constellation Pisces is easiest to see in October and November, or in the late afternoon hours of September. Because its stars are relatively faint, Pisces is most visible in a dark country sky.
The constellation Pisces is part of a larger group that includes Pegasus, Andromeda, Aries, and Triangulum. The stars that make up Pisces form a rough V shape. The eastern fish has a small triangular head and the western fish has a small circle for a head. It is located just to the side of the Great Square of Pegasus in the northern hemisphere sky, and the fish’s heads are to the west or southeast of the Square.
Northern Hemisphere
The chart shows the position of Pisces in most of the United States in January at 9:00 p.m. This chart can also be applied to other areas of the northern hemisphere such as Canada, the United Kingdom, and Europe. You will need dark skies away from light pollution to see the constellation completely.
In August and September, the constellation will appear low on the eastern horizon around 11:00 p.m. At around 3:00 a.m., it will be high in the southern night sky before moving toward the western horizon.
In October, it will appear low on the eastern horizon around 8:00 p.m., rising in the southern night sky at midnight and then continuing toward the western horizon until dawn.
In November, it will be visible in the eastern night sky from 7:00 p.m., and by 10:00 p.m. it will be high in the southern night sky and begin to dip below the western horizon around 3:00 a.m. In December and January, Pisces will first appear high in the southern sky around 6 to 7 p.m., and around midnight it will begin to sink below the western horizon.
Southern Hemisphere
The chart shows the position of Pisces over most of Australia in mid-spring at 11 p.m. This chart can also be applied to other areas of the southern hemisphere such as New Zealand, South Africa, and South America. In the southern hemisphere, Pisces is visible in the northern night sky, but you will need dark skies to see it fully.
In October, Pisces becomes visible around 9 p.m. on the eastern horizon, and by 1 a.m. it will be in the northern night sky before moving toward the western horizon.
In November, the constellation will appear in the northeastern night sky around 10 p.m., and by midnight it will be in the northern night sky before beginning to dip below the western horizon around 4 a.m. In December, it will be briefly visible in the northwestern night sky between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m.
The history of Pisces
The ancient Babylonians saw the constellation Pisces as two separate objects: the Great Swallow (a bird) and the Lady of Heaven. Later, the Greeks and Romans saw a goddess of love and fertility: for the Greeks, it was Aphrodite, while for the Romans, it was Venus. Chinese astronomers saw this region of the sky as a fence built by farmers to prevent animals from escaping. Today, most astronomers think of Pisces as two fish in the sky.
Main stars of the Pisces constellation
The number next to each star is its apparent magnitude, its brightness from our viewpoint on Earth. The lower the number, the brighter the star will be in the night sky.
Eta Piscium
Eta Piscium is a yellow giant star about 300 light-years from Earth. It is about 26 times larger in radius than the Sun and has four times its mass. It is the brightest star in the constellation, although its apparent magnitude is only 3.62.
Alrisha
Also known as Alpha Piscium, Alrisha is a binary star system consisting of two blue-white main sequence stars. The two stars are separated by a distance of about 11 billion miles (18 billion km) and take about 700 years to orbit each other. The Alpha Piscium system is about 140 light-years from Earth.
Omega Piscium
Omega Piscium is a yellow-white main sequence star about 100 light-years from Earth with twice the mass of the Sun.
Gamma Piscium
Gamma Piscium is a yellow giant star about 140 light-years from Earth, with about the same mass as the Sun but 10 times larger in radius.
The brightest stars in Pisces
Pisces is not one of the brightest constellations in the sky, but it is large. It has several bright stars, including α Piscium, also known as Alrescha (Arabic for “the cord”). Alrescha, located about 140 light-years away, lies at the deepest point of the V shape.
The second brightest star is β Piscium, with the long informal name Fumalsamakah (meaning “mouth of the fish” in Arabic). It is much further away from us, at a distance of just under 500 light-years. There are about 20 more bright stars within the “fish” pattern of Pisces, and many others in the region officially designated by the IAU as “Pisces” on its charts.
Deep sky objects in Pisces
The constellation Pisces does not have many very obvious deep sky objects, but the best one for astronomers to see is a galaxy called M74 (from Charles Messier’s list of “faint fuzzy objects”).
M74 is a spiral galaxy, similar in shape to the Milky Way (although its arms are not as tight as those of our home galaxy). It is located about 30 million light-years away from us.
Professional astronomers study M74 continuously because it is “face-on” from our vantage point here on Earth. This positioning allows astronomers to study star-forming regions in the spiral arms and search for variable stars, supernovae, and other objects among the 100 billion stars that make up the galaxy.
Astronomers use instruments such as the Spitzer Space Telescope to study the galaxy for star-forming regions, as it is a prodigious star-forming galaxy. They are also intrigued by the possibility of a black hole at the heart of M74.
Although not in Pisces, the Triangulum Galaxy (known as M33) is right next to the western fish’s head. It is a spiral galaxy that is actually part of the Local Group of galaxies that includes the Milky Way.
Andromeda is the largest member of the group, the Milky Way is the second largest, and M33 is the third largest. Interestingly, astronomers have observed that Andromeda and M33 are linked by streams of gas, meaning that the two have had a tango in the past and will likely interact again in the distant future.
Myth of the Pisces constellation
The constellation Pisces is of Babylonian origin. The Babylonians saw it as a pair of fish joined by a rope. The constellation is often associated with the Roman myth of Venus and Cupid, who tied themselves together with a rope and transformed themselves into fish to escape the monster Typhon. The star Alpha Piscium, also known by its traditional name Alrescha (“the rope” in Arabic), marks the knot in the rope.
The constellation is associated with a similar story in Greek mythology. After the Olympian gods had defeated the Titans and the Giants, Gaia, or Mother Earth, together with Tartarus, the region of the underworld where Zeus had the Titans imprisoned, had Typhon, the most terrifying monster the world had ever seen. Typhon had a hundred dragon heads, with fire burning in all his eyes.
Gaia sent Typhon to defeat the gods. Pan was the first to see him coming. He alerted the other gods and then transformed himself into a goat fish and jumped into the Euphrates River to escape the monster. The goat fish is represented by the constellation Capricorn. The goddess Aphrodite and her son Eros called the water nymphs for help and jumped into the river. In one version of the legend, two fish came to the rescue and carried Aphrodite and Eros on their backs to safety. In another version, the mother and son transformed themselves into fish.
