Pleïone

Pleïone was the daughter of Oceanus and Tethys, and the mother of the seven daughters known as the Pleiades (see entry above). Her name can mean any of the root words proposed for the Pleiades, so that she can be a 'sailor', a 'dove', a 'full one' or a 'turner'. All of these are suitable in their way.

From the astronomical point of view it is worth pointing out that when the telescope had been invented, and the Pleiades were found to number far more than seven, the names of Pleïone and her husband Atlas were assigned to two more stars in the cluster. This was thanks to the observations made in the seventeenth century by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Riccioli, and he it was who added the names of mother and father to those of their offspring.