The water-bearer
Aquarius pours water from a jar. The Greeks usually made him Ganymede, the Trojan youth Zeus carried off to serve the gods their wine.
In the tradition
Hyginus names Ganymede first and then gives other candidates: Deucalion, who survived the great flood, and Cecrops, an early king of Athens. The jar’s stream runs down into the mouth of the Southern Fish.
The Babylonians saw a figure pouring water here too, and the sign is still drawn with the jar on the shoulder.
Sources
- Hyginus, De Astronomia (1st century BCE or later). The Latin handbook of constellation myths, often giving several versions side by side.
- Pseudo-Eratosthenes, Catasterismi (Hellenistic, surviving in an epitome). A collection of the myths told about how each constellation came to be in the sky.
Updated October 9, 2026.
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