Man in the Moon

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For the J.R.R. Tolkien folklore, see Man in the Moon (Middle-earth). You may also be looking for Man on the Moon or perhaps the 1991 film entitled The Man in the Moon

An image of the Man in the Moon in the film Le Voyage dans la Lune.

The Man in the Moon is a figure resembling a human face, perceived in the full Moon in some cultures. The figure is composed of large dark areas (the lunar maria, or seas) on the Moon's surface. The figure's eyes are the Mare Imbrium and Mare Serenitatis, its nose is the Sinus Aestuum, and its open mouth is the Mare Nubium and Mare Cognitum.

The conventionalized image of the Man in the Moon, unlike the vague natural appearance, bears just a very simple, wide-grinning face.

John Lyly says in the prologue to his Endymion (1591), "There liveth none under the sunne, that knows what to make of the man in the moone."

There is also a tradition that the Man in the Moon enjoyed to drink, especially claret. An old ballad runs (original spelling):

"Our man in the moon drinks clarret,

With powder-beef, turnep, and carret.

If he doth so, why should not you

Drink until the sky looks blew?"

Plutarch, in his treatise, Of the Face appearing in the roundle of the Moone, cites the poet Agesinax as saying of that orb,

"All roundabout environed

With fire she is illumined:

And in the middes there doth appeere,

Like to some boy, a visage cleere;

Whose eies to us doe seem in view,

Of colour grayish more than blew:

The browes and forehead tender seeme,

The cheeks all reddish one would deeme."

There is also a Talmudic tradition, that Jacob is on the moon, although no such mention appears in the Bible. Another tradition, both Christian and Jewish, claims him as Cain, the Wanderer, forever doomed to circle the Earth. Dante's Inferno alludes to this:

"For now doth Cain with fork of thorns confine On either hemisphere, touching the wave Beneath the towers of Seville. Yesternight The moon was round."

The Chinese Man in the Moon is called "Yue-lao".

There are various explanations as to how there came to be a man in the Moon.

1 Pareidolia, and other things on the moon
2 References
3 External links
- 3.1 Mythology
- 3.2 Chinese Moon festival legends

[edit] Pareidolia, and other things on the moon

The Man in the Moon is an example of pareidolia. Other cultures perceive the silhouette of a woman, a hare, a Frog, Moose, or a buffalo in the full moon.

In the Dune series by Frank Herbert, one of the moons of Arrakis has a mouse shadow, and the hero, Paul Atreides, takes one of his names from it. The definition of muad'dib is:

"The adapted kangaroo mouse of Arrakis, a creature associated in the Fremen earth-spirit mythology with a design visible on the planet's second moon. This creature is admired by Fremen for its ability to survive in the open desert."

The two moons of Arrakis, while circling an alien world, have a distinct resemblance to our own.

The Nepalese have a tradition that the dead go to the Moon.

The Jefferson Airplane song Come Too Soon (1979) mentions visiting "that old man up in the moon".

There is a traditional Mother Goose nursery rhyme featuring the Man in the Moon:

"The man in the moon came down too soon,
and asked his way to Norwich,
He went by the south and burnt his mouth
By supping on cold plum porridge."

[edit] References

The Man in the Moon drinks Claret, as it was sung at the Court in Holy-well. Bagford Ballads, Folio Collection in the British Museum, vol. ii. No. 119.
Plutarch's Morals. Translated by Holland. London, 1603, p. 1160.
Dante's Inferno, Canto xx., line 123.