Calle Estrella Shaula

Shaula is the second-brightest star in Scorpius, and from Earth it seems fixed right at the tip of the tail. Hence the name: from the Arabic al-šawlā, “the raised one” or “the stinger,” because together with its neighbor Lesath it traces the curved tail the animal lifts to strike. It is a bluish, very hot star, some five hundred and seventy light-years away. Calle de la Estrella Shaula belongs to the cluster of Delicias streets named after stars and celestial bodies, near the Planetarium. Names that sit hundreds of light-years apart in the sky and fit into a few blocks of Arganzuela here. From Madrid, Shaula barely rises above the southern horizon on summer nights: it peaks very low, grazing the rooftops.