
Aurora is the Roman name for the Goddess of the Dawn. Her name simply means "the dawn, daybreak, or sunrise". Her name may be related to Latin aurum, meaning "gold", through the shared idea of brightness.
Ovid tells of Her in his Metamorphoses: he describes Her as being ever-young, and the first to awake, so that She may bring the light of day in Her chariot which She rides into the sky ahead of the Sun. She has a purple mantle that spreads out behind Her as She rides; and She is said to scatter roses and flowers before Her. Others describe Her with great white wings, like Eos. She is said to be the mother of the four winds; though this part of Her legend is Greek, one variant spelling of Her name, Aurura, has the meaning of "breeze or wind".
An aurora is of course also the name for the phenomenon of the northern (or southern) lights, great displays of shifting colors in the skies of the far north and south. Aurora borealis is said to mean "red dawn of the north", and was given its name by Galileo Galilei, the scientist who discovered the moons of Jupiter. Aurorae are caused by solar particles interacting with gasses in the Earth's atmosphere. The Earth's magnetic field funnels these particles to the poles (both north and south), where they emit light, in colors ranging from red to yellow-green to blue and violet, depending on the atmospheric molecule the particles come in contact with. They are generally said to look like shifting curtains or veils of light, evoking Aurora's purple cloak blowing behind Her as She rides across the sky.
Happy Birthday Aurora
