The high visibility of the star cluster Pleiades in the night sky and its position along the ecliptic (which approximates to the Solar System's common planetary plane) has given it importance in many cultures, ancient and modern. Its heliacal rising, which moves through the seasons over millennia (see precession) was nonetheless a date of folklore or ritual for various ancestral groups, so too its yearly heliacal setting.Brad Schaefer (Yale University). Heliacal Rising: Definitions, Calculations, and some Specific Cases (Essays from Archaeoastronomy & Ethnoastronomy News, the Quarterly Bulletin of the Center for Archaeoastronomy, Number 25.)

As noted by scholar Stith Thompson, the constellation was "nearly always imagined" as a group of seven sisters, and their myths explain why there are only six.Thompson, Stith (1977). The Folktale. University of California Press. pp. 237-238. . Some scientists suggest that these may come from observations back when Pleione was further from Atlas and more visible as a separate star as far back as 100,000 BC.Norris, Ray P., Norris, Barnaby R.M. (2021). Why Are There Seven Sisters?. In: Boutsikas, E., McCluskey, S.C., Steele, J. (eds) Advancing Cultural Astronomy. Historical & Cultural Astronomy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-64606-6_11

North Africa

Berber people Tuareg Berbers of the northern Sahara call the Pleiades Cat iheḍ (or -ahăḍ). This Berber name means: "daughters of the night". To many other Berbers it is Tagemmunt ("the group").

A Tuareg Berber proverb says:

Meaning: When the Pleiades "fall" with the sunset on the west, it still roughly (at J2000) means the hot, dry summer is coming. When they rise from the east with sunrise, the cold somewhat rainy season is coming. Nomads and others need to brace for these seasonal changes."Étoiles et constellations chez les nomades, Edmond Bernus & Ehya ag-Sidiyene" In: Awal magazine, 1989, Édition de la maison des sciences de l'homme, Paris, France.Essai sur les origines des Touaregs

Middle East Mesopotamia The Mesopotamian cuneiform texts of the MUL.APIN, which were produced from the seventh century BC onwards, describe Pleiades leap rules for the intercalation of months. They refer to a time well before the creation of the surviving clay tablets, which have been copied several times, namely the 26th century BC. This results from the astronomical dates explicitly given in the texts for the visibility of the Pleiades (Sumerian term MUL.MUL = "stars") and the beginnings of the months. The two surviving Babylonian Pleiades leap rules are recorded in lines eight to eleven of the second clay tablet of the MUL.APIN series. Although the cuneiform characters of the beginnings of lines ten and eleven have not been completely preserved, they can be reconstructed relatively reliably and meaningfully. A normal year has twelve lunar months. A full year requires the intercalation of a thirteenth lunar month. According to this leap rule, seven synodical month have to be intercalated within the duration of a Metonic cycle, which has exactly nineteen solar years.Werner Papke: Zwei Plejaden-Schaltregeln aus dem 3. Jahrtausend, Archiv für Orientforschung, 31. Band, 1984, Seiten 67-70

8 When on the first Nisannu Pleiades and moon are in balance, this year is normal. 9 When on the third Nisannu Pleiades and moon are in balance, this year is full. 10 When the Pleiades rise on the first Ajaru, this year is normal. 11 When the Pleiades rise on the first Simanu, this year is full.

Bible, ancient Israelite religion and the Levant In the Old Testament, the Pleiades () are mentioned three times. Each passage also mentions Orion, a nearby, bright, anthropomorphic constellation: ; ; and . The first two are references about their creation. The third (taken in the context of following verses) stresses their ongoing nature in the night sky; God is speaking directly to Job and challenges him, asking if he can bind the chains of the Pleiades — the implication being that Job cannot, but God can.

Talmud The Talmud (Berakhot 58b) suggests understanding as kimah ( as ) "about one hundred" stars in the Pleiades star cluster. Like most astronomical figures in rabbinic writing, the Jewish sages pointed to this as having come from Mount Sinai.

Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki ("Rashi") suggested even more stars within the cluster when he commented on the Talmud with a question, "What is meant by Kimah?" It is then understood that the Talmud was suggesting hundreds of stars in the Pleiades cluster, and that only the first hundred are mentioned due to them being the most important.

Other Jewish sources According to Jewish folklore, when two fallen angels named Azazel and Shemhazai made it to the Earth, they fell strongly in love with the women of humankind. Shemhazai found a maiden named Istehar who swore she would give herself to him if he told her the sacred name which granted him the power to fly to Heaven. He revealed it to her, but she flew up to Heaven, never to fulfill her promise, thus she was placed in the constellation Pleiades, Entry: Volume I, "Noah: The Punishment of the Fallen Angels" although she is also associated with the planet Venus.

Arabia and Islamic sources

In Arabic the Pleiades are known as (), the first main consonant becoming a morpheme into outlying linguistic zones north and east. Some scholars of Islam suggested that the Pleiades are the "star" mentioned in Sura An-Najm ("The Star") of the Quran.

The name was borrowed into Persian and Turkish as a female given name, and is in use throughout the Middle East (for example Princess Soraya of Iran and Thoraya Obaid). It eponymises the Thuraya satellite phone system of the United Arab Emirates.

A Hadith recalled by Imam Bukhari, states:

Notes:

Turkey In Turkish the Pleiades are known as . According to the Middle Turkic lexicographer Kaşgarlı Mahmud, writing in the 11th century, refers to a military ambush ( meaning 'troops in battle formation'): "The army is broken up into detachments posted in various places," and when one detachment falls back the others follow after it, and by this device "(the enemy) is often routed." Thus literally means 'an army made up of a group of detachments', which forms an apt simile for a star cluster. Ülker is also a unisex given name, a surname and the name of a food company best known for its chocolates.

Iran

In Farsi, the Pleiades is primarily known as () or Parveen. It is a common given name of Iranians, Afghanis and some Pakistanis.

Europe In French, pléiade means "a host" or "multitude". Pleiades has thus gained, in a few European tongues, several creative derivations of this non-stellar meaning.

Greek mythology

In Greek mythology, the stars of Pleiades represented the Seven Sisters. The constellation was also described as ἑπτάποροι "heptaporoi", by poet Aratus.

Western astrology

The astrological Pleiades were described in Three Books of Occult Philosophy by Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa (Köln, 1533, but published manuscript as early as 1510).

In Western astrology they represent coping with sorrowMorse, Eric (1988). The Living Stars. London: Amethyst Books. and were considered a single one of the medieval fixed stars. As such, they are associated with quartz and fennel.

In esoteric astrology the seven planetary systems revolve around Pleiades.Bailey, Alice (1934). Esoteric Astrology. New York: Lucis Publishing Company.

Celtic mythology

To the Bronze Age people of Europe, such as the Celts (and probably considerably earlier), the Pleiades were associated with mourning and with funerals, since at that time in history, on the cross-quarter day between the autumn equinox and the winter solstice (see Samhain, also Halloween or All Souls Day), which was a festival devoted to the remembrance of the dead, the cluster rose in the eastern sky as the Sun's light faded in the evening. It was from this acronychal rising that the Pleiades became associated with tears and mourning. As a result of precession over the centuries, the Pleiades no longer marked the festival, but the association has nevertheless persisted, and may account for the significance of the Pleiades astrologically.

In later Welsh mythology, the Pleiades are known as Tŵr Tewdws (English: "Theodosius' Tower", but may also mean "Tower of Blessing" or "Tower of Light") Tŵr Tewdws is used as a metaphor by the fifteenth century bard Dafydd ab Edmwnd in his poem I Wallt Merch ("A lady’s hair").

Baltic mythology

In Baltic languages, the name for this constellation is in Lithuanian and in Latvian, which is derived from meaning "a sieve". In Lithuanian folk songs this constellation is often personified as a benevolent brother who helps orphan girls to marry or walks soldiers along the fields. But in Lithuanian folk tales as well as Latvian folk songs this constellation is usually depicted as an inanimate object, a sieve which gets stolen by the devil from the thunder god or is used to conjure light rain by thunder's wife and children.Vaiškūnas, Jonas. "Pleiades in Lithuanian ethnoastronomy". In: Actes de la Vème Conférence Annuelle de la SEAC, Gdańsk 1997. Warszawa–Gdańsk: Instytut Archeologii Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 1999, pp. 225–237.

Danish folklore Ethnographer Svend Grundtvig collected a folkloric account of the myth of the Pleiades in Danish folklore ("The Pleiades, or the Seven Stars").Grundtvig, Svend. Fairy Tales from Afar. Translated from the Danish Popular Tales of Svend Grundtvig by Jane Mulley. New York: A. Wessels Company, 1902. pp. 154-166. In this variant, six brothers travel the world to learn a trade and, with their combined help, rescue a kidnapped princess from a dwarf. Unable to choose which brother she likes best, God allows the seven to die in their sleep and turns them into the seven stars of the constellation.Lansing, Marion Florence. Fairy tales. Vol. 2. Boston, New York [etc.]: Ginn and company. 1908. pp. 62-68, 179.

Hungarian folklore The old name of the starcluster in Hungarian is , meaning "a hen with chicks".

Slavic folklore

Russian folklore In historical Russian treatises about astronomy, the constellation was known as , as well as . Another Russian name to the constellation is or , related by some scholars to the word ('hair'), and to the god Volos.Haney, Jack V. An Introduction to the Russian Folktale. M.E. Sharpe, 1999. pp. 67-68. .Shapiro, Michael. The Sense of Change: Language as History. Indiana University Press, 1991. p. 104. .

Ukrainian folklore In Ukrainian folklore, the Pleiades are known as (), (), or ().

can be etymologically traced to () meaning a 'granary', 'storehouse for hay and crops', or can also be reduced to the root (), meaning 'hundredfold glowing' or "a hundred embers".The Comprehensive Dictionary of the Contemporary Ukrainian Language. Perun Publishers, 2005.

() or () refer to the female tribal deities. According to the legend, seven maids lived long ago. They used to dance the traditional round dances and sing the glorious songs to honor the gods. After their death the gods turned them into water nymphs, and, having taken them to the Heavens, settled them upon the seven stars, where they dance their round dances (symbolic for moving the time) to this day.

In Ukraine, this asterism was considered a female talisman until recent times.

Belarusian tradition The constellation of the Pleiades is known by several names in Belarusian tradition, such as ('a sieve'), and, in a legend from the Horvats, there are seven ('spirits of deceased maidens') who dance around in a circle. Further studies by researcher Tsimafei Avilin show the main names of the constellation in Belarusian: Sieve (Sita or, rarely, Rešata, and variations) and The Hens (Kuročka and variations).

Serbian folklore