A shared universe › Blog › The way of the stars · Español
On a moonless night, far from the city, a whitish band crosses the sky from side to side. In many Spanish villages it was not called the Milky Way. It was called the Camino de Santiago, the Way of Saint James.
The Codex Calixtinus, a twelfth-century book devoted to the apostle James, tells that the emperor Charlemagne saw in a dream a road of stars that began at the Frisian sea and reached Galicia. The apostle appeared to him and told him that the road marked the place of his tomb. It is a legend, and should be read as one. But for centuries the pilgrims walking west had above their heads, on clear nights, a band of light that seemed to go the same way they did.
That band is our own galaxy seen from inside. The Sun is one star among hundreds of billions, all spread across an enormous disc. When we look towards the plane of that disc, we see so many stars so far away that their light merges into a cloud. Galileo was the first to confirm it, when he pointed his telescope at it.
City light has wiped out the Milky Way for most people. You have to travel some distance and wait for a moonless night to see it. Those who see it for the first time tend to fall silent.
What the legend manages to say is something else: that whoever walks towards something they cannot yet see needs a sign that they are on the right path. Waiting is like that. You cannot see the end, but it helps to know that others have walked the same road before and that you are not walking alone.
In A shared universe, the Milky Way crosses the background. If you are waiting for something, you can light a star with “What I hope for”, and other people will keep it company while it comes.