From Antares to Zimmerwald: A Sky Full of References!
What’s in an astronomical name?
“A for Apple
B for Ball
C for Cat (coughs)
Read on to find out
What this is all about!”
Before we get started, let us look at some perspectives. Our Universe is estimated to have 200 billion to over 2 trillion galaxies. An impressive number huh? What if I told you, at 37.2 trillion in number, there are more cells in your human body than all the galaxies in the observable universe!
Each galaxy may have over 100 billion stars in them. Interestingly, the human brain has about 100 billion neurons roughly. Some quick math would give us a rough estimate that the total number of the stars in our universe is over 1 billion trillion. That is 1 followed by 21 zeroes! Let me write it down for the effect of it. 1000000000000000000000. That’s huge. Each star could have other countless celestial objects like planets, comets, or asteroids orbiting around it. Clearly, when it comes to numbers, everything about our universe is off the charts but after all we, who observe it, are equally complex.
So you may question, “We get it! Everyone knows the Universe is huge. What’s the relation between these numbers and the title of this article?”
Before I break that to you, let’s play a small fun game. I’ll just put up a group of names, and you’ll have to guess what is common to all of them.
- Merope, Bellatrix, Regulus, Alphard, Sirius, Arcturus
- Phoebe, Juliet, Miranda, Elara
- Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, James Bond, Holmes
The answers are put up towards the end of the article but wait before you scroll to them in joy, confident that you have guessed it right.
Coming back to the question, you may have already guessed it, the problem that comes with greater numbers is naming them all! Astronomical names are easily some of the most beautiful words you will see in all of literature. Most names, in fact, originate from the lore and legends of the human species, the mythology, various beliefs and the culture of ancient civilizations. However, we do have some original names that first appeared in astronomy and then were adapted elsewhere. Objects discovered recently are named using various guidelines laid by the International Astronomical Union. This article is not about naming celestial objects or learning about different conventions. I’ll drop in a few links at the end for you to explore more on that later. We are now going to discuss something more unique.
An astronomical name isn’t just a name for identification of an object. Every name comes with a story to tell. We have celestial objects named after almost all religions and cultures of humanity. More than often, these names are associated with various mythologies of the Greeks, Romans, Arabic, etc.
Today, we humans project ourselves into the cosmos by sending in signals and whispers into the abyss that this universe is, hoping to make a mark for ourselves. Maybe, it was our ancestors’ way of presenting themselves, their thoughts, ideas, and stories into the universe that laid the basis for the origin of all these names. Every shining object in the night sky has a much deeper meaning left behind by the ancient astronomers. Also, the mythologies associated with various constellations are next to none in the brilliance of imaginative skills.
Let’s now get to the main part. This article is all about celebrating everything that symbolizes humanity through astronomical names. With that being said, Nakshatra presents you here, what can be called the Astro-Phonic song, following the idea that there is an astronomical name for every letter out there. (remember that alphabet song you probably learnt in your primary school?)
Pardon me if your favorite celestial object didn’t make it to the list! I have included a tag phrase for each celestial object and their origin for reference.
A for Antares (‘rival to Ares (Mars)’; Greek)
-The brightest star of the constellation, Scorpius
B for Betelgeuse (‘the hand of Orion’; Arabic)
-Central star of the winter hexagon
C for Calypso (the daughter of Atlas; Greek)
-The most reflective moon of Saturn
D for Deneb (‘the tail of the hen’; Arabic)
-The northernmost star of the summer triangle
E for Eris (the goddess of strife and discord; Greek)
-A dwarf planet and the most distant natural object of the solar system
F for Fornax (the chemical furnace; Latin)
-A modern constellation in the western quadrant of the sky
G for Ganymede (the successor of Hebe; Greek)
-The largest moon of our solar system
H for Halley’s(Named after the discoverer, Edmond Halley)
- The most famous comet out there
I for Io (the mortal lover of Zeus; Greek)
- The densest and the driest natural satellite, fourth largest Jupiter’s moon
J for Janus (the god of beginnings and endings; Roman)
-An inner satellite of Saturn
K for Kleopatra (named after the last active ruler of the Ptolemaic kingdom of Egypt)
-The ham bone shaped asteroid with two moons!
L for Luna (the divine personification of the Moon; Roman)
-Our friendly neighborhood satellite, the Moon
M for Meissa (‘the shining one’; Arabic)
-A star in the constellation of Orion
N for Nibiru (the Babylonian astronomical term for the equinox)
-The hypothetical planet X (Yup! we have hypothetical objects here as well!)
O for Ophelia (the daughter of Polonius in Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet)
-The outer shepherd satellite of Uranus’s ε ring
P for Polaris (stella illa quae polaris dicitur; Latin)
-The brightest star in the constellation of Ursa Minor, also known as the Pole Star
Q for Quaoar (the Tongva (native of Los Angeles) creator God)
-A trans-Neptunian object in the Kuiper belt
R for Rigel (‘the left leg (foot) of Jauzah’; Arabic)
-The brightest star in the constellation of Orion
S for Sirius (‘the scorcher’; Latin origins)
-The brightest star in the night sky
T for Titania (the queen of fairies; inspired from a Shakespeare’s play)
-The largest moon of Uranus
U for Ursula (the name with unknown origin)
-The parent asteroid of the Ursula family
V for Venus (the goddess of love and beauty; Roman)
-Earth’s closest planetary neighbor
W for Willman 1 (in honor of the lead researcher Beth Willman)
-The least massive galaxy in the known observable universe
X for Xenophanes (named after an ancient Greek philosopher and poet)
-An asteroid from the main belt
Y for Ymir (the ancestor of frost giants; Norse mythology)
-The retrograde irregular moon of saturn
Z for Zimmerwald (named after the village of Zimmerwald)
-A eunomian asteroid from the middle region of the asteroid belt.
(Feel free to use this Astro-Phonic song in your astronomy 101 classes!)
For everything that we create here on Earth, there is an object far away, drifting in space bearing the same name. May be that’s our way to reaching the stars and conquering the realm of reality.
Remember that small game we played before?(Scroll up if you want to take a quick glance at the questions) Here are the answers!
- They are all not just characters from the Harry Potter franchise but also the names of some of the most prominent stars of the night sky. (A bonus info; there exists an asteroid named ‘Hermione’ in our solar system)
- They are not just a group of famous characters from pop culture but also the names of the moons of different planets of our solar system. (Can you identify all the pop culture references here?)
- They are not just the world’s greatest tennis players and fictional detectives respectively but also the names of asteroids orbiting the sun. (Crazy right? Imagine that right now a James Bond is revolving around the sun!)
What’s in an astronomical name, you ask? The love of those who dedicate it to someone else, honor to those who stood apart from the rest of the world, and the legacy of our past lest it should be forgotten.
What’s in an astronomical name, you ask? An answer in the form of an asterisk! (Here is a bonus challenge for you. Can you decode the hidden message in the above line?)
“What’s in an astronomical name, you ask? A hitchhiker’s guide to humanity!”
Do follow Nakshatra and stay tuned for a future article where the answer to the bonus challenge as well as all the Easter eggs hidden in this article will be revealed! (Yep! there are plenty of them!)
Links to explore further in astronomical naming rules and regulations:
The mid-credits scene:
Read the follow-up article with the answer to the puzzle here: https://medium.com/nakshatra/the-starring-role-today-belongs-to-the-stars-a3e70c9ad95c
