Caput Draconis in Virgo. Do you know what that is?

Back from a fast dinner. I have seen a few of the workshop participants. But this short post is about something else, still connected to astronomy (or should I write astrology?), though. I am reading “The Lost Symbol“, by Dan Brown. Interesting, although it shares many of the features already seen in Angels & Demons and The Da Vinci Code. In the initial part of the book, one reads “Caput Draconis in Virgo“. Does anybody know what this means? I have surfed the net, but there seems to be some confusion about it. Most likely Caput Draconis does not refer to the head of the Draco constellation (or to a single star), but rather to the nodal points of lunar orbit. In fact I remember from my spherical astronomy times that there is a draconic year, related to moon eclipses (the Draco would eat the moon, so to speak, during an eclipse).

I’m now finishing the book. By the way, on today’s flight Munich-Amsterdam, there was a person sitting close to me, reading the same book, same edition (his was an hardcover, mine a paperback). After a while I realized this person is also working at ESO. One of those coincidences…

G’d night…