Generalities: it is a northern constellation among the most brightest ones.It contains Capella, the sixth star of the whole sky for brightness. The charioteer transits at midnight in December.
 
Origins and mythology: there are different mythological interpretations. According to a first interpretation it represents the charioteer Blueberry, son of Mercury and coachman of  king Enomao. According to other interpretations instead, it  represents Erittonius, son of the god Volcano, who invented the chariot and  became king of Athens.

Stars: the charioteer contains Capella, the sixth star of the whole sky for brightness. It is yellow, of magnitude 0.06 and  45 light-years far. The second star for brightness is beta, named Menkarlina, of white color and  72 light-years far. Other three stars are under  magnitude 3. The star epsilon, a varying eclipse star, has very high intrinsic brightness, as it is 3,300 light-years far.

Table of stars brighter than magnitude 3.5
 

Star	Proper name	Magnitude	Spectrum	Colour	Distance (light-years)	Notes
Alpha	Capella	0.06	G8	yellow-orange	45	6th star in the sky
Beta	Menkarlina	1.90	A2	white	72
Theta		2.62	A0p	white	82
Iota	Hassaleh	2.69	K3	orange	268
Epsilon		2.99 (var.)	F0	white-yellow	3300
Eta		3.17	B3	white-blue	200
Delta		3.72	K0	orange	163
Zeta	Sadatoni	3.75 (var.)	K4	orange-red	520

Other objects: it contains three very beautiful open clusters, M36, M37, M38. M37 is the richest and brightest one, it is about 4,200 light-years far.
 

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