97-475: The Aitken Double Star Catalogue , or ADS , is a star catalogue of double stars . It was compiled by Robert Grant Aitken and published in 1932 in two volumes, under the name New general catalogue of double stars within 120° of the North Pole . It contains measurements of 17,180 double stars north of declination −30°. Entries in this catalogue are generally referred to by an index number prefixed with
194-425: A celestial coordinate system lies in one of the modern constellations. Some astronomical naming systems include the constellation where a given celestial object is found to convey its approximate location in the sky. The Flamsteed designation of a star, for example, consists of a number and the genitive form of the constellation's name. Other star patterns or groups called asterisms are not constellations under
291-423: A star chart for illustration. Most modern catalogues are available in electronic format and can be freely downloaded from space agencies' data centres . The largest is being compiled from the spacecraft Gaia and thus far has over a billion stars. Completeness and accuracy are described by the faintest limiting magnitude V (largest number) and the accuracy of the positions . From their existing records, it
388-838: A combination of Gaia and Tycho-2 data for those objects in both catalogues, light curves, and characteristics for about 3000 variable stars, and positions and magnitudes for more than 2000 extragalactic sources used to define the celestial reference frame. The second data release (DR2), which occurred on 25 April 2018, is based on 22 months of observations made between 25 July 2014 and 23 May 2016. It includes positions, parallaxes, and proper motions for about 1.3 billion stars and positions of an additional 300 million stars, red and blue photometric data for about 1.1 billion stars and single colour photometry for an additional 400 million stars, and median radial velocities for about 7 million stars between magnitude 4 and 13. It also contains data for over 14,000 selected Solar System objects. The first part of
485-429: A full set of the classical constellations around 370 BC. His catalogue Phaenomena , rewritten by Aratus of Soli between 275 and 250 BC as a didactic poem, became one of the most consulted astronomical texts in antiquity and beyond. It contained descriptions of the positions of the stars and the shapes of the constellations, and provided information on their relative times of rising and setting. Approximately in
582-452: A list of 88 constellations with three-letter abbreviations for them. However, these constellations did not have clear borders between them. In 1928, the IAU formally accepted the 88 modern constellations, with contiguous boundaries along vertical and horizontal lines of right ascension and declination developed by Eugene Delporte that, together, cover the entire celestial sphere; this list
679-421: A long tradition of observing celestial phenomena. Nonspecific Chinese star names , later categorized in the twenty-eight mansions , have been found on oracle bones from Anyang , dating back to the middle Shang dynasty . These constellations are some of the most important observations of Chinese sky, attested from the 5th century BC. Parallels to the earliest Babylonian (Sumerian) star catalogues suggest that
776-810: A lot of catalogues cross-reference the Durchmusterungs without specifying which one is used in the zones of overlap, so some confusion often remains. Star names from these catalogues include the initials of which of the four catalogues they are from (though the Southern follows the example of the Bonner and uses BD; CPD is often shortened to CP), followed by the angle of declination of the star (rounded towards zero, and thus ranging from +00 to +89 and −00 to −89), followed by an arbitrary number as there are always thousands of stars at each angle. Examples include BD+50°1725 or CD−45°13677. The Henry Draper Catalogue
873-427: A reference by observatories around the world throughout the 19th century. The Bonner Durchmusterung ( German : Bonn sampling) and follow-ups were the most complete of the pre-photographic star catalogues. The Bonner Durchmusterung itself was published by Friedrich Wilhelm Argelander , Adalbert Krüger , and Eduard Schönfeld between 1852 and 1859. It covered 320,000 stars in epoch 1855.0. As it covered only
970-639: A special data set, the Gaia Andromeda Photometric Survey (GAPS). The final Gaia catalogue is expected to be released three years after the end of the Gaia mission. Specialized catalogues make no effort to list all the stars in the sky, working instead to highlight a particular type of star, such as variables or nearby stars . Aitken 's double star catalogue (1932) lists 17,180 double stars north of declination −30 degrees. Stephenson's General Catalogue of galactic Carbon stars
1067-558: A star which is often referred to by one of these unofficial GJ numbers is GJ 3021 . The General Catalogue of Trigonometric Parallaxes, first published in 1952 and later superseded by the New GCTP (now in its fourth edition), covers nearly 9,000 stars. Unlike the Gliese, it does not cut off at a given distance from the Sun; rather it attempts to catalogue all known measured parallaxes. It gives
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#17327801350211164-505: Is a catalogue of 7000+ carbon stars . The Gliese (later Gliese- Jahreiß ) catalogue attempts to list all star systems within 20 parsecs (65 ly) of Earth ordered by right ascension (see the List of nearest stars and brown dwarfs ). Later editions expanded the coverage to 25 parsecs (82 ly). Numbers in the range 1.0–915.0 ( Gl numbers) are from the second edition, which was The integers up to 915 represent systems which were in
1261-538: Is an astronomical catalogue that lists stars . In astronomy , many stars are referred to simply by catalogue numbers. There are a great many different star catalogues which have been produced for different purposes over the years, and this article covers only some of the more frequently quoted ones. Star catalogues were compiled by many different ancient people, including the Babylonians , Greeks , Chinese , Persians , and Arabs . They were sometimes accompanied by
1358-533: Is attributed to Shi Shen, and the Astronomic star observation (天文星占, Tianwen xingzhan) to Gan De. It was not until the Han dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) that astronomers started to observe and record names for all the stars that were apparent (to the naked eye ) in the night sky, not just those around the ecliptic. A star catalogue is featured in one of the chapters of the late 2nd-century-BC history work Records of
1455-433: Is known that the ancient Egyptians recorded the names of only a few identifiable constellations and a list of thirty-six decans that were used as a star clock . The Egyptians called the circumpolar star "the star that cannot perish" and, although they made no known formal star catalogues, they nonetheless created extensive star charts of the night sky which adorn the coffins and ceilings of tomb chambers. Although
1552-505: Is omitted. The epoch for the position measurements in the latest edition is J2000.0 . The SAO catalogue contains this major piece of information not in Draper, the proper motion of the stars, so it is often used when that fact is of importance. The cross-references with the Draper and Durchmusterung catalogue numbers in the latest edition are also useful. Names in the SAO catalogue start with
1649-663: Is one of the best, both in the proper motion and star position till 1999. Not as precise as the Hipparcos catalogue but with many more stars. The PPM was built from BD, SAO, HD, and more, with sophisticated algorithm and is an extension for the Fifth Fundamental Catalogue, " Catalogues of Fundamental Stars ". The Hipparcos catalogue was compiled from the data gathered by the European Space Agency 's astrometric satellite Hipparcos , which
1746-645: Is the Suzhou Astronomical Chart , which was prepared with carvings of stars on the planisphere of the Chinese sky on a stone plate; it is done accurately based on observations, and it shows the supernova of the year of 1054 in Taurus. Influenced by European astronomy during the late Ming dynasty , charts depicted more stars but retained the traditional constellations. Newly observed stars were incorporated as supplementary to old constellations in
1843-604: The Yale Catalog of Bright Stars , this catalogue contained information on all stars brighter than visual magnitude 6.5 in the Harvard Revised Photometry Catalogue . The list was revised in 1983 with the publication of a supplement that listed additional stars down to magnitude 7.1. The catalogue detailed each star's coordinates, proper motions , photometric data, spectral types , and other useful information. The last printed version of
1940-614: The Cape Photographic Durchmusterung (450,000 stars, 1896), compiled at the Cape, South Africa, covers declinations −18 to −90. Astronomers preferentially use the HD designation (see next entry) of a star, as that catalogue also gives spectroscopic information, but as the Durchmusterungs cover more stars they occasionally fall back on the older designations when dealing with one not found in Draper. Unfortunately,
2037-505: The Hubble Space Telescope program. The first version of the catalogue was produced in the late 1980s by digitizing photographic plates and contained about 20 million stars, out to about magnitude 15. The latest version of this catalogue contains information for 945,592,683 stars, out to magnitude 21. The latest version continues to be used to accurately position the Hubble Space Telescope . The PPM Star Catalogue (1991)
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#17327801350212134-616: The KJV , but ‘Ayish "the bier" actually corresponding to Ursa Major. The term Mazzaroth מַזָּרוֹת , translated as a garland of crowns , is a hapax legomenon in Job 38:32, and it might refer to the zodiacal constellations. There is only limited information on ancient Greek constellations, with some fragmentary evidence being found in the Works and Days of the Greek poet Hesiod , who mentioned
2231-484: The Maragheh observatory 's Zij-i Ilkhani (1272), and Ulugh Beg 's Zij-i Sultani (1437). Other famous Arabic star catalogues include Alfraganus ' A compendium of the science of stars (850) which corrected Ptolemy's Almagest ; and al-Sufi 's Book of Fixed Stars (964) which described observations of the stars , their positions, magnitudes , brightness, and colour , drawings for each constellation , and
2328-526: The Naval Observatory server. The entire 50GB compressed catalog can be downloaded via BitTorrent using instructions from Skychart . The Naval Observatory is currently working on B2 and C variants of the USNO catalogue series. The Guide Star Catalog is an online catalogue of stars produced for the purpose of accurately positioning and identifying stars satisfactory for use as guide stars by
2425-510: The Paris Observatory and so it describes mostly northern stars. This catalogue contained the positions and magnitudes of 47,390 stars, out to magnitude 9, and was the most complete catalogue up to that time. A significant reworking of this catalogue by followers of Lalande in 1846 added reference numbers to the stars that are used to refer to some of these stars to this day. The decent accuracy of this catalogue kept it in common use as
2522-675: The Zhou dynasty ( c. 1050 – 256 BC) which provide star names include the Zuo Zhuan , the Shi Jing , and the " Canon of Yao " (堯典) in the Book of Documents . The Lüshi Chunqiu written by the Qin statesman Lü Buwei ( d. 235 BC ) provides most of the names for the twenty-eight mansions (i.e. asterisms across the ecliptic belt of the celestial sphere used for constructing
2619-675: The Zodiac of Dendera ; it remains unclear when this occurred, but most were placed during the Roman period between 2nd to 4th centuries AD. The oldest known depiction of the zodiac showing all the now familiar constellations, along with some original Egyptian constellations, decans , and planets . Ptolemy's Almagest remained the standard definition of constellations in the medieval period both in Europe and in Islamic astronomy . Ancient China had
2716-551: The calendar ). An earlier lacquerware chest found in the Tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng (interred in 433 BC) contains a complete list of the names of the twenty-eight mansions . Star catalogues are traditionally attributed to Shi Shen and Gan De , two rather obscure Chinese astronomers who may have been active in the 4th century BC of the Warring States period (403–221 BC). The Shi Shen astronomy (石申天文, Shi Shen tienwen)
2813-490: The celestial equator , twelve for " Ea " south of that, and twelve for " Enlil " to the north. The Mul.Apin lists, dated to sometime before the Neo-Babylonian Empire (626–539 BC), are direct textual descendants of the "Three Stars Each" lists and their constellation patterns show similarities to those of later Greek civilization . In Ancient Greece , the astronomer and mathematician Eudoxus laid down
2910-592: The horizon when viewed from a particular latitude on Earth is termed circumpolar . From the North Pole or South Pole , all constellations south or north of the celestial equator are circumpolar . Depending on the definition, equatorial constellations may include those that lie between declinations 45° north and 45° south, or those that pass through the declination range of the ecliptic (or zodiac ) ranging between 23.5° north and 23.5° south . Stars in constellations can appear near each other in
3007-583: The zodiac (straddling the ecliptic , which the Sun , Moon , and planets all traverse). The origins of the zodiac remain historically uncertain; its astrological divisions became prominent c. 400 BC in Babylonian or Chaldean astronomy. Constellations appear in Western culture via Greece and are mentioned in the works of Hesiod , Eudoxus and Aratus . The traditional 48 constellations, consisting of
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3104-458: The "heavenly bodies". Greek astronomy essentially adopted the older Babylonian system in the Hellenistic era , first introduced to Greece by Eudoxus of Cnidus in the 4th century BC. The original work of Eudoxus is lost, but it survives as a versification by Aratus , dating to the 3rd century BC. The most complete existing works dealing with the mythical origins of the constellations are by
3201-607: The 14th century. The Ancient Greek word for constellation is ἄστρον ( astron ). These terms historically referred to any recognisable pattern of stars whose appearance was associated with mythological characters or creatures, earthbound animals, or objects. Over time, among European astronomers, the constellations became clearly defined and widely recognised. In the 20th century, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) recognized 88 constellations . A constellation or star that never sets below
3298-529: The 17,000-year-old cave paintings in Lascaux , southern France, depict star constellations such as Taurus, Orion's Belt, and the Pleiades. However, this view is not generally accepted among scientists. Inscribed stones and clay writing tablets from Mesopotamia (in modern Iraq) dating to 3000 BC provide the earliest generally accepted evidence for humankind's identification of constellations. It seems that
3395-456: The 3rd century BC, the Greek astronomers Timocharis of Alexandria and Aristillus created another star catalogue. Hipparchus ( c. 190 – c. 120 BC ) completed his star catalogue in 129 BC, the earliest known attempt to map the entire sky, which he compared to Timocharis ' and discovered that the longitude of the stars had changed over time. This led him to determine
3492-556: The 88 IAU-recognized constellations in this region first appeared on celestial globes developed in the late 16th century by Petrus Plancius , based mainly on observations of the Dutch navigators Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman . These became widely known through Johann Bayer 's star atlas Uranometria of 1603. Fourteen more were created in 1763 by the French astronomer Nicolas Louis de Lacaille , who also split
3589-603: The Bright Star Catalogue was the 4th revised edition, released in 1982. The 5th edition is in electronic form and is available online. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory catalogue was compiled in 1966 from various previous astrometric catalogues, and contains only the stars to about ninth magnitude for which accurate proper motions were known. There is considerable overlap with the Henry Draper catalogue, but any star lacking motion data at that time
3686-472: The English astronomer John Flamsteed 's Historia coelestis Britannica (1725). It kept the genitive-of-the-constellation rule for the back end of his catalogue names, but used numbers instead of the Greek alphabet for the front half. Examples include 61 Cygni and 47 Ursae Majoris . Bayer and Flamsteed covered only a few thousand stars between them. In theory, full-sky catalogues try to list every star in
3783-601: The Grand Historian by Sima Qian (145–86 BC) and contains the "schools" of Shi Shen and Gan De's work (i.e. the different constellations they allegedly focused on for astrological purposes). Sima's catalogue—the Book of Celestial Offices (天官書 Tianguan shu)—includes some 90 constellations, the stars therein named after temples , ideas in philosophy , locations such as markets and shops, and different people such as farmers and soldiers . For his Spiritual Constitution of
3880-742: The Hellenistic writer termed pseudo-Eratosthenes and an early Roman writer styled pseudo- Hyginus . The basis of Western astronomy as taught during Late Antiquity and until the Early Modern period is the Almagest by Ptolemy , written in the 2nd century. In the Ptolemaic Kingdom , native Egyptian tradition of anthropomorphic figures represented the planets, stars, and various constellations. Some of these were combined with Greek and Babylonian astronomical systems culminating in
3977-504: The IAU as well as those by cultures throughout history are imagined figures and shapes derived from the patterns of stars in the observable sky. Many officially recognized constellations are based on the imaginations of ancient, Near Eastern and Mediterranean mythologies. Some of these stories seem to relate to the appearance of the constellations, e.g. the assassination of Orion by Scorpius, their constellations appearing at opposite times of year. Constellation positions change throughout
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4074-572: The Navigator in c. 500 BC. The history of southern constellations is not straightforward. Different groupings and different names were proposed by various observers, some reflecting national traditions or designed to promote various sponsors. Southern constellations were important from the 14th to 16th centuries, when sailors used the stars for celestial navigation . Italian explorers who recorded new southern constellations include Andrea Corsali , Antonio Pigafetta , and Amerigo Vespucci . Many of
4171-528: The Universe (靈憲, Ling Xian) of 120 AD, the astronomer Zhang Heng (78–139 AD) compiled a star catalogue comprising 124 constellations. Chinese constellation names were later adopted by the Koreans and Japanese . A large number of star catalogues were published by Muslim astronomers in the medieval Islamic world . These were mainly Zij treatises, including Arzachel 's Tables of Toledo (1087),
4268-535: The ancient Sumerians were the first to record the names of constellations on clay tablets , the earliest known star catalogues were compiled by the ancient Babylonians of Mesopotamia in the late 2nd millennium BC, during the Kassite Period ( c. 1531 – c. 1155 BC ). They are better known by their Assyrian-era name 'Three Stars Each'. These star catalogues, written on clay tablets , listed thirty-six stars: twelve for " Anu " along
4365-599: The ancient Chinese system did not arise independently. Three schools of classical Chinese astronomy in the Han period are attributed to astronomers of the earlier Warring States period . The constellations of the three schools were conflated into a single system by Chen Zhuo , an astronomer of the 3rd century ( Three Kingdoms period ). Chen Zhuo's work has been lost, but information on his system of constellations survives in Tang period records, notably by Qutan Xida . The oldest extant Chinese star chart dates to that period and
4462-409: The ancient constellation Argo Navis into three; these new figures appeared in his star catalogue, published in 1756. Several modern proposals have not survived. The French astronomers Pierre Lemonnier and Joseph Lalande , for example, proposed constellations that were once popular but have since been dropped. The northern constellation Quadrans Muralis survived into the 19th century (when its name
4559-733: The bulk of the Mesopotamian constellations were created within a relatively short interval from around 1300 to 1000 BC. Mesopotamian constellations appeared later in many of the classical Greek constellations. The oldest Babylonian catalogues of stars and constellations date back to the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age , most notably the Three Stars Each texts and the MUL.APIN , an expanded and revised version based on more accurate observation from around 1000 BC. However,
4656-655: The celestial equator), and southern constellations Puppis , Vela , Carina , Crux , Centaurus , Triangulum Australe , and Ara . Polaris , being the North Star, is the approximate center of the northern celestial hemisphere. It is part of Ursa Minor , constituting the end of the Little Dipper's handle. From latitudes of around 35° north, in January, Ursa Major (containing the Big Dipper ) appears to
4753-416: The co-ordinates in 1900 epoch, the secular variation, the proper motion, the weighted average absolute parallax and its standard error, the number of parallax observations, quality of interagreement of the different values, the visual magnitude, and various cross-identifications with other catalogues. Auxiliary information, including UBV photometry, MK spectral types, data on the variability and binary nature of
4850-491: The constellation Orion : A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The first constellations were likely defined in prehistory . People used them to relate stories of their beliefs, experiences, creation , and mythology . Different cultures and countries invented their own constellations, some of which lasted into
4947-717: The daytime and lower at night, while in winter the reverse is true, for both hemispheres. Due to the Solar System 's 60° tilt, the galactic plane of the Milky Way is inclined 60° from the ecliptic, between Taurus and Gemini (north) and Scorpius and Sagittarius (south and near which the Galactic Center can be found). The galaxy appears to pass through Aquila (near the celestial equator) and northern constellations Cygnus , Cassiopeia , Perseus , Auriga , and Orion (near Betelgeuse ), as well as Monoceros (near
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#17327801350215044-524: The development of today's accepted modern constellations. The southern sky, below about −65° declination , was only partially catalogued by ancient Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks, Chinese, and Persian astronomers of the north. The knowledge that northern and southern star patterns differed goes back to Classical writers, who describe, for example, the African circumnavigation expedition commissioned by Egyptian Pharaoh Necho II in c. 600 BC and those of Hanno
5141-432: The early 20th century before today's constellations were internationally recognized. The recognition of constellations has changed significantly over time. Many changed in size or shape. Some became popular, only to drop into obscurity. Some were limited to a single culture or nation. Naming constellations also helped astronomers and navigators identify stars more easily. Twelve (or thirteen) ancient constellations belong to
5238-399: The early constellations were never universally adopted. Stars were often grouped into constellations differently by different observers, and the arbitrary constellation boundaries often led to confusion as to which constellation a celestial object belonged. Before astronomers delineated precise boundaries (starting in the 19th century), constellations generally appeared as ill-defined regions of
5335-557: The early releases also miss some stars, especially fainter stars located in dense star fields. Data from every data release can be accessed at the Gaia archive . Gaia DR1, the first data release based on 14 months of observations made through September 2015, took place on 13 September 2016. The data release includes positions and magnitudes in a single photometric band for 1.1 billion stars using only Gaia data, positions, parallaxes, and proper motions for more than 2 million stars based on
5432-425: The ecliptic), approximating a great circle . Zodiacal constellations of the northern sky are Pisces , Aries , Taurus , Gemini , Cancer , and Leo . In the southern sky are Virgo , Libra , Scorpius , Sagittarius , Capricornus , and Aquarius . The zodiac appears directly overhead from latitudes of 23.5° north to 23.5° south, depending on the time of year. In summer, the ecliptic appears higher up in
5529-453: The entire celestial sphere without burdening too many institutions, the sky was divided among 20 observatories, by declination zones. Each observatory exposed and measured the plates of its zone, using a standardized telescope (a "normal astrograph ") so each plate photographed had a similar scale of approximately 60 arcsecs/mm. The U.S. Naval Observatory took over custody of the catalogue, now in its 2000.2 edition. First published in 1930 as
5626-406: The first edition. Numbers with a decimal point were used to insert new star systems for the second edition without destroying the desired order (by right ascension ). This catalogue is referred to as CNS2, although this name is never used in catalogue numbers. Numbers in the range 9001–9850 ( Wo numbers) are from the supplement Numbers in the ranges 1000–1294 and 2001–2159 ( GJ numbers) are from
5723-597: The first known description of the Andromeda Galaxy . Many stars are still known by their Arabic names (see List of Arabic star names ). The Motul Dictionary , compiled in the 16th century by an anonymous author (although attributed to Fray Antonio de Ciudad Real ), contains a list of stars originally observed by the ancient Mayas . The Maya Paris Codex also contains symbols for different constellations which were represented by mythological beings. Two systems introduced in historical catalogues remain in use to
5820-490: The first value of the precession of the equinoxes . In the 2nd century, Ptolemy ( c. 90 – c. 186 AD ) of Roman Egypt published a star catalogue as part of his Almagest , which listed 1,022 stars visible from Alexandria . Ptolemy's catalogue was based almost entirely on an earlier one by Hipparchus. It remained the standard star catalogue in the Western and Arab worlds for over eight centuries. The Islamic astronomer al-Sufi updated it in 964, and
5917-507: The form of star charts , whose oldest representation appears on the statue known as the Farnese Atlas , based perhaps on the star catalogue of the Greek astronomer Hipparchus . Southern constellations are more modern inventions, sometimes as substitutes for ancient constellations (e.g. Argo Navis ). Some southern constellations had long names that were shortened to more usable forms; e.g. Musca Australis became simply Musca. Some of
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#17327801350216014-621: The formal definition, but are also used by observers to navigate the night sky. Asterisms may be several stars within a constellation, or they may share stars with more than one constellation. Examples of asterisms include the teapot within the constellation Sagittarius , or the big dipper in the constellation of Ursa Major . The word constellation comes from the Late Latin term cōnstellātiō , which can be translated as "set of stars"; it came into use in Middle English during
6111-572: The letters ADS . The catalog was a successor to the Burnham Double Star Catalogue and was based on observations compiled by Sherburne Wesley Burnham from 1906 to 1912, and by Eric Doolittle from 1912 to 1919. Aitken began work on the catalog shortly after Doolittle's death in 1920. The catalog contains observations made up to 1927. This astronomical catalog article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Star catalogue A star catalogue
6208-661: The letters SAO, followed by a number. The numbers are assigned following 18 ten-degree bands in the sky, with stars sorted by right ascension within each band. USNO-B1.0 is an all-sky catalogue created by research and operations astrophysicists at the U.S. Naval Observatory (as developed at the United States Naval Observatory Flagstaff Station ), that presents positions, proper motions, magnitudes in various optical passbands, and star/galaxy estimators for 1,042,618,261 objects derived from 3,643,201,733 separate observations. The data
6305-480: The mid-18th century when European explorers began traveling to the Southern Hemisphere . Due to Roman and European transmission, each constellation has a Latin name. In 1922, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) formally accepted the modern list of 88 constellations , and in 1928 adopted official constellation boundaries that together cover the entire celestial sphere. Any given point in
6402-423: The money required to finance it. HD numbers are widely used today for stars which have no Bayer or Flamsteed designation. Stars numbered 1–225300 are from the original catalogue and are numbered in order of right ascension for the 1900.0 epoch . Stars in the range 225301–359083 are from the 1949 extension of the catalogue. The notation HDE can be used for stars in this extension, but they are usually denoted HD as
6499-449: The northeast, while Cassiopeia is the northwest. To the west are Pisces (above the horizon) and Aries. To the southwest Cetus is near the horizon. Up high and to the south are Orion and Taurus. To the southeast above the horizon is Canis Major . Appearing above and to the east of Orion is Gemini : also in the east (and progressively closer to the horizon) are Cancer and Leo. In addition to Taurus, Perseus and Auriga appear overhead. From
6596-653: The northern sky and some of the south (being compiled from the Bonn observatory), this was then supplemented by the Südliche Durchmusterung (SD), which covers stars between declinations −1 and −23 degrees (1886, 120,000 stars). It was further supplemented by the Cordoba Durchmusterung (580,000 stars), which began to be compiled at Córdoba, Argentina in 1892 under the initiative of John M. Thome and covers declinations −22 to −90. Lastly,
6693-454: The numbering ensures that there can be no ambiguity. The Catalogue astrographique (Astrographic Catalogue) was part of the international Carte du Ciel programme designed to photograph and measure the positions of all stars brighter than magnitude 11.0. In total, over 4.6 million stars were observed, many as faint as 13th magnitude. This project was started in the late 19th century. The observations were made between 1891 and 1950. To observe
6790-602: The numerous Sumerian names in these catalogues suggest that they built on older, but otherwise unattested, Sumerian traditions of the Early Bronze Age . The classical Zodiac is a revision of Neo-Babylonian constellations from the 6th century BC. The Greeks adopted the Babylonian constellations in the 4th century BC. Twenty Ptolemaic constellations are from the Ancient Near East. Another ten have
6887-538: The parts of the southern sky unknown to Ptolemy) by Petrus Plancius (1592, 1597/98 and 1613), Johannes Hevelius (1690) and Nicolas Louis de Lacaille (1763), who introduced fourteen new constellations. Lacaille studied the stars of the southern hemisphere from 1751 until 1752 from the Cape of Good Hope , when he was said to have observed more than 10,000 stars using a refracting telescope with an aperture of 0.5 inches (13 mm). In 1922, Henry Norris Russell produced
6984-455: The pole star include Chamaeleon , Apus and Triangulum Australe (near Centaurus), Pavo , Hydrus , and Mensa . Sigma Octantis is the closest star approximating a southern pole star, but is faint in the night sky. Thus, the pole can be triangulated using the constellation Crux as well as the stars Alpha and Beta Centauri (about 30° counterclockwise from Crux) of the constellation Centaurus (arching over Crux). It has been suggested that
7081-467: The present day. The first system comes from the German astronomer Johann Bayer 's Uranometria , published in 1603 and regarding bright stars. These are given a Greek letter followed by the genitive case of the constellation in which they are located; examples are Alpha Centauri or Gamma Cygni . The major problem with Bayer's naming system was the number of letters in the Greek alphabet (24). It
7178-695: The same latitude, in July, Cassiopeia (low in the sky) and Cepheus appear to the northeast. Ursa Major is now in the northwest. Boötes is high up in the west. Virgo is to the west, with Libra southwest and Scorpius south. Sagittarius and Capricorn are southeast. Cygnus (containing the Northern Cross ) is to the east. Hercules is high in the sky along with Corona Borealis . January constellations include Pictor and Reticulum (near Hydrus and Mensa, respectively). In July, Ara (adjacent to Triangulum Australe) and Scorpius can be seen. Constellations near
7275-836: The same stars but different names. Biblical scholar E. W. Bullinger interpreted some of the creatures mentioned in the books of Ezekiel and Revelation as the middle signs of the four-quarters of the Zodiac, with the Lion as Leo , the Bull as Taurus , the Man representing Aquarius , and the Eagle standing in for Scorpio . The biblical Book of Job also makes reference to a number of constellations, including עיש ‘Ayish "bier", כסיל chesil "fool" and כימה chimah "heap" (Job 9:9, 38:31–32), rendered as "Arcturus, Orion and Pleiades" by
7372-570: The sky, but they usually lie at a variety of distances away from the Earth. Since each star has its own independent motion, all constellations will change slowly over time. After tens to hundreds of thousands of years, familiar outlines will become unrecognizable. Astronomers can predict the past or future constellation outlines by measuring common proper motions of individual stars by accurate astrometry and their radial velocities by astronomical spectroscopy . The 88 constellations recognized by
7469-564: The sky. Today they now follow officially accepted designated lines of right ascension and declination based on those defined by Benjamin Gould in epoch 1875.0 in his star catalogue Uranometria Argentina . The 1603 star atlas " Uranometria " of Johann Bayer assigned stars to individual constellations and formalized the division by assigning a series of Greek and Latin letters to the stars within each constellation. These are known today as Bayer designations . Subsequent star atlases led to
7566-454: The sky. There are, however, billions of stars resolvable by 21st century telescopes , so this is an impossible goal; with this kind of catalog, an attempt is generally made to get every star brighter than a given magnitude . Jérôme Lalande published the Histoire céleste française in 1801, which contained an extensive star catalog, among other things. The observations made were made from
7663-536: The southern hemisphere of the sky based on the knowledge of Western star charts; with this improvement, the Chinese Sky was integrated with the World astronomy. Historically, the origins of the constellations of the northern and southern skies are distinctly different. Most northern constellations date to antiquity, with names based mostly on Classical Greek legends. Evidence of these constellations has survived in
7760-595: The southern sky, which did not depict the traditional stars recorded by ancient Chinese astronomers. Further improvements were made during the later part of the Ming dynasty by Xu Guangqi and Johann Adam Schall von Bell , the German Jesuit and was recorded in Chongzhen Lishu (Calendrical Treatise of Chongzhen period , 1628). Traditional Chinese star maps incorporated 23 new constellations with 125 stars of
7857-464: The star positions were redetermined by Ulugh Beg in 1437, but it was not fully superseded until the appearance of the thousand-star catalogue of Tycho Brahe in 1598. The ancient Vedic and other scriptures of India were very well aware of the astronomical positions and constellations. Both Mahabharata and Ramayana provide references to various events in terms of the planetary positions and constellations of that time. The Planetary positions at
7954-558: The stars, orbits when available, and miscellaneous information to aid in determining the reliability of the data are also listed. A common way of detecting nearby stars is to look for relatively high proper motions . Several catalogues exist, of which we'll mention a few. The Ross and Wolf catalogues pioneered the domain: Willem Jacob Luyten later produced a series of catalogues: L – Luyten, Proper motion stars and White dwarfs LFT – Luyten Five-Tenths catalogue LHS – Luyten Half-Second catalogue Constellation Four views of
8051-498: The supplement The range 1000–1294 represents nearby stars, while 2001–2159 represents suspected nearby stars. In the literature, the GJ numbers are sometimes retroactively extended to the Gl numbers (since there is no overlap). For example, Gliese 436 can be interchangeably referred to as either Gl 436 or GJ 436. Numbers in the range 3001–4388 are from Although this version of the catalogue
8148-534: The third data release, EDR3 (Early Data Release 3) was released on 3 December 2020. It is based on 34 months of observations and consists of improved positions, parallaxes, and proper motions of over 1.8 billion objects The full DR3, published in June 2022, includes the EDR3 data plus Solar System data; variability information; results for non-single stars, for quasars, and for extended objects; astrophysical parameters; and
8245-565: The time of Mahabharata war has been given comprehensively. A very interesting and exhaustive discussion about the planetary positions along with specific name of constellations appears in a paper by R N Iyengar in the Indian Journal of History of Science . The earliest known inscriptions for Chinese star names were written on oracle bones and date to the Shang dynasty ( c. 1600 – c. 1050 BC ). Sources dating from
8342-409: The year due to night on Earth occurring at gradually different portions of its orbit around the Sun. As Earth rotates toward the east, the celestial sphere appears to rotate west, with stars circling counterclockwise around the northern pole star and clockwise around the southern pole star. Because of Earth's 23.5° axial tilt , the zodiac is distributed equally across hemispheres (along
8439-508: The years and centuries to come. The constellations have no official symbols, though those of the ecliptic may take the signs of the zodiac. Symbols for the other modern constellations, as well as older ones that still occur in modern nomenclature, have occasionally been published. The Great Rift, a series of dark patches in the Milky Way, is most visible in the southern sky. Some cultures have discerned shapes in these patches. Members of
8536-525: The zodiac and 36 more (now 38, following the division of Argo Navis into three constellations) are listed by Ptolemy , a Greco-Roman astronomer from Alexandria , Egypt, in his Almagest . The formation of constellations was the subject of extensive mythology , most notably in the Metamorphoses of the Latin poet Ovid . Constellations in the far southern sky were added from the 15th century until
8633-467: Was attached to the Quadrantid meteor shower), but is now divided between Boötes and Draco . A list of 88 constellations was produced for the IAU in 1922. It is roughly based on the traditional Greek constellations listed by Ptolemy in his Almagest in the 2nd century and Aratus ' work Phenomena , with early modern modifications and additions (most importantly introducing constellations covering
8730-533: Was easy to run out of letters before running out of stars needing names, particularly for large constellations such as Argo Navis . Bayer extended his lists up to 67 stars by using lower-case Roman letters ("a" through "z") then upper-case ones ("A" through "Q"). Few of those designations have survived. It is worth mentioning, however, as it served as the starting point for variable star designations , which start with "R" through "Z", then "RR", "RS", "RT"..."RZ", "SS", "ST"..."ZZ" and beyond. The second system comes from
8827-498: Was finally published in 1930. Where possible, these modern constellations usually share the names of their Graeco-Roman predecessors, such as Orion, Leo, or Scorpius. The aim of this system is area-mapping, i.e. the division of the celestial sphere into contiguous fields. Out of the 88 modern constellations, 36 lie predominantly in the northern sky, and the other 52 predominantly in the southern. The boundaries developed by Delporte used data that originated back to epoch B1875.0 , which
8924-420: Was obtained from scans of 7,435 Schmidt plates taken for the various sky surveys during the last 50 years. USNO-B1.0 is believed to provide all-sky coverage, completeness down to V = 21, 0.2 arcsecond astrometric accuracy at J2000.0 , 0.3 magnitude photometric accuracy in up to five colors, and 85% accuracy for distinguishing stars from non-stellar objects. USNO-B is now followed by NOMAD ; both can be found on
9021-477: Was operational from 1989 to 1993. The catalogue was published in June 1997 and contains 118,218 stars; an updated version with re-processed data was published in 2007. It is particularly notable for its parallax measurements, which are considerably more accurate than those produced by ground-based observations. The Gaia catalogues are based on observations made by the Gaia space telescope. They are released in stages that contain increasing amounts of information;
9118-688: Was preserved as part of the Dunhuang Manuscripts . Native Chinese astronomy flourished during the Song dynasty , and during the Yuan dynasty became increasingly influenced by medieval Islamic astronomy (see Treatise on Astrology of the Kaiyuan Era ). As maps were prepared during this period on more scientific lines, they were considered as more reliable. A well-known map from the Song period
9215-408: Was published in the period 1918–1924. It covers the whole sky down to about ninth or tenth magnitude, and is notable as the first large-scale attempt to catalogue spectral types of stars. The catalogue was compiled by Annie Jump Cannon and her co-workers at Harvard College Observatory under the supervision of Edward Charles Pickering , and was named in honour of Henry Draper , whose widow donated
9312-428: Was termed "preliminary", it is still the current one as of March 2006 , and is referred to as CNS3. It lists a total of 3,803 stars. Most of these stars already had GJ numbers, but there were also 1,388 which were not numbered. The need to give these 1,388 some name has resulted in them being numbered 3001–4388 ( NN numbers, for "no name"), and data files of this catalogue now usually include these numbers. An example of
9409-406: Was when Benjamin A. Gould first made his proposal to designate boundaries for the celestial sphere, a suggestion on which Delporte based his work. The consequence of this early date is that because of the precession of the equinoxes , the borders on a modern star map, such as epoch J2000 , are already somewhat skewed and no longer perfectly vertical or horizontal. This effect will increase over
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