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Polaris is the brightest star in the constellation of Ursa Minor (upper right). Big Dipper and Ursa Minor in relation to Polaris. A view of Polaris in a small telescope. Polaris B is separated by 18 arc seconds from the primary star, Polaris A. A 4 day time lapse of Polaris illustrating its Cepheid type variability.
Pole star. A pole star is a visible star that is approximately aligned with the axis of rotation of an astronomical body; that is, a star whose apparent position is close to one of the celestial poles. On Earth, a pole star would lie directly overhead when viewed from the North or the South Pole .
The North Star was a nineteenth-century anti-slavery newspaper published from the Talman Building in Rochester, New York, by abolitionists Martin Delany and Frederick Douglass. The paper commenced publication on December 3, 1847, and ceased as The North Star in June 1851, when it merged with Gerrit Smith's Liberty Party Paper (based in Syracuse ...
Axial precession. Precessional movement of Earth. Earth rotates (white arrows) once a day around its rotational axis (red); this axis itself rotates slowly (white circle), completing a rotation in approximately 26,000 years [1] In astronomy, axial precession is a gravity-induced, slow, and continuous change in the orientation of an astronomical ...
Songs. One reportedly coded Underground Railroad song is "Follow the Drinkin' Gourd". [ 1] The song's title is said to refer to the star formation (an asterism) known in America as the Big Dipper and in Europe as The Plough. The pointer stars of the Big Dipper align with the North Star. In this song the repeated line "Follow the Drinkin' Gourd ...
The north and south celestial poles are the two points in the sky where Earth 's axis of rotation, indefinitely extended, intersects the celestial sphere. The north and south celestial poles appear permanently directly overhead to observers at Earth's North Pole and South Pole, respectively. As Earth spins on its axis, the two celestial poles ...
Many star names are, in origin, descriptive of the part in the constellation they are found in; thus Phecda, a corruption of Arabic فخذ الدب ( fakhdh ad-dubb, 'thigh of the bear'). Only a handful of the brightest stars have individual proper names not depending on their asterism; so Sirius ('the scorcher'), Antares ('rival of Ares ', i.e ...
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. [1] The first constellations likely go back to prehistory. People used them to relate stories of their beliefs, experiences, creation, mythology.