History and Mythology
The charioteer is either the god Hephaestus or his son Erechtheus. Both of these gods were lame and invented the chariot to get around. Sometimes, Auriga the charioteer is seen as a herd of goats, where the brightest star, Capella, is seen as the shief goat and there are a few kids around him. Capella, in fact, is often associated with Amalthea, the goat that nursed the young Zeus. A story says that while playing with the goat, Zeus accidentally broke one of the horns, which he later gave the magical ability to make large quantities of food and drink. Capella is seen to the Indians as the heart of Brahma and to the people of Peru, this star (Colca to them) was associated with herders of flocks. This constellation is also celebrated because it comes up right before Orion and Taurus, which are celebrated constellations. Because of Auriga's location in the Milky Way, there are a lot of objects to be found.
Stars
alpha-Capella-Latin for she-goat, this star is important because it is in between the north celestial pole and celestial equator, meaning that it is up for at least part of every month. This star has a faint 10-th magnitude companion Spectral Type-G8 III Magnitude- .1 Distance- 42 ly
beta-Menkalin-Arabic for 'shoulder of the rein-holder' (charioteer), this star is a slight variable because it is an eclipsing binary Spectral Type- A2 IV Magnitude- around 2 Distance- 72 ly
gamma Auriga-now known as beta Tauri (El Nath)
delta- Spectral Type- K0 III Magnitude- 3.7 Distance- 165 ly
epsilon-this 'star' is actually five stars in the Milky Way. Two of these stars form an eclipsing variable with a period of 27 days; this information is about the brightest of the stars Spectral Type- F0 Ia Magnitude- 3.0 Distance- 4600 ly
zeta-another pair of eclipsing binary stars Spectral Type- K4 II and B7 V Magnitude- 3.7 to 4.0 Distance- 520 ly
eta- Spectral Type- B3 V Magnitude- 3.2 Distance- 200 ly
iota- Spectral Type- K3 III Magnitude- 2.7 Distance- 265 ly
Star Clusters
Many star clusters find their home in the constellation of Auriga. 3 Messier Objects can be found on a line perpendicular to the line connecting alpha and beta. These are M36, and open cluster of 6th magnitude containing around 60 stars 3,700 ly away, M37, another open cluster of 6th magnitude with around 150 stars, and M38, which is an open cluster of about 7th magnitude with around 100 stars. NGC 2281 is an open cluster with about 30 stars. There are some other open clusters in the neighborhood of the Messier Objects, but you will have to look extremely careful for these.
Nebulae
There are some diffuse nebula in the center of the constellation, but there are better things to look at. The brightest planetary nebula is IC 2149 of 9th magnitude, and the brightest nebula is IC 415. This nebula is located a few degrees west of the Messier Objects. This nebula of 6th magnitude is fed ultraviolet light from the nearby variable AE Aurigae. The length of it as it appears from earth is the same as that of the full moon. It is actually 2,200 ly away and has a rough diameter of 9 ly.
Galaxies
Because the Milky Way is all across the constellation, we cannot see outside of our own galaxy to look at others through this constellation.