Algorab

Delta Corvi — the raven's wing

Position (J2000)

13°27′ Libra

Magnitude

2.95

Colour

White

Spectrum

A0 IV

Distance

87 light-years

Nature

Mars · Saturn

In the sky

Algorab is a modest star at magnitude 2.95, white, about eighty-seven light-years away, with a fainter orange companion visible in a small telescope. It lies in Corvus, the Crow, a compact and slightly lopsided quadrilateral south of Virgo which is easier to identify than its brightness suggests, since nothing nearby competes with it. It is found below Spica in spring, at the upper left corner of the figure.

The myth

Apollo sent the crow for water. The crow found a fig tree, waited several days for the figs to ripen, ate them, and returned late carrying a water-snake and an account of having been delayed. Apollo placed crow, cup and snake in the sky together, with the cup permanently out of the bird's reach.

The story concerns intelligence put to poor use, and the older texts are correspondingly severe about the star. It is worth noting what a crow actually is, however: among the most resourceful of birds, capable of tool use, of long memory, and of distinguishing individual human faces. The astrological material here concerns that intelligence, which is formidable and hazardous chiefly to its owner. The bird has a second office: cleaner of the field — the nerve to name what is rotten and carry away what has decayed — and a corresponding fault, the telling bent far enough that even the true parts stop being usable.

What it gives

• An eye for discarded value The native sees what a neglected thing could become — a building, a manuscript, a failing business, a person others have written off — and generally has the ingenuity to get it there.
• Practical resourcefulness Restorers, salvagers, researchers working through abandoned material, and artists building from scrap all draw on this placement.
• Independence from fashion The native is unusually free of prevailing opinion about what is worth attention, and is frequently correct that something is being overlooked.
• Speed of practical reasoning The mind here works quickly toward a workable answer rather than an elegant one.

What to watch for

• Justification after the fact The tradition's warnings about deceit describe a mind quick enough to construct a good reason for whatever it has already decided to do.
• The small self-serving delay The crow's failing was appetite followed by a serviceable excuse, and it is the pattern rather than the appetite that does the damage.
• Accumulation without use The salvaging eye degrades into simple hoarding: possessions, materials or projects kept because they might one day be useful.
• Cleverness preferred to honesty Where a difficulty could be met either by ingenuity or by a plain admission, this placement reaches for ingenuity by default.

How to work with it

Take the longer route occasionally and deliberately, in circumstances where nobody would know the difference. This is the practical maintenance of an instrument that is otherwise reliable.

Watch for the small delay and the account that assembles itself afterwards, since this is where the placement's characteristic trouble begins rather than in anything larger.

Either restore what has been gathered or release it. Material kept indefinitely against a future use is the visible form of this star's failure mode.

In brief

Algorab describes resourceful intelligence and a particular eye for value that others have discarded. Its risks are internal rather than external: a mind fast enough to justify its own decisions after making them, a tendency to prefer ingenuity to plain dealing, and accumulation that never turns into use. Kept honest, it is among the most practically capable placements in the catalogue.