The ‘Dog Days’ of Summer is about Sirius and started because Sirius’ heliacal rising coincided with the hottest days of the year. In Egypt it signaled the annual flooding of the Nile so the Goddess Sopdet associated with it was held in very high regard.

Hesiod in his Works and Days said this period was when “women are most wanton, but men are feeblest, because Sirius parches head and knees and the skin is dry through heat.”

Sirius is one of two ‘dog stars’ being the two brightest in Canis Major who is Orion’s hunting dog.

In Homer’s Iliad Book 22 it says, “Old Priam was first to see him, racing over the plain, his bronze breastplate gleaming like Sirius, the star of harvest, brightest of stars in the dark of night. Orion’s Dog, men call it, glittering brightly yet boding ill, bringing fever to wretched mortals.”

See, Achilles is the star Canis Major which is considered Orion’s hunting dog in some cultures. Likely the one that kept The Iliad alive.