Wezen
From All Skies Encyclopaedia
Authors: IAU-WGSN Etymology Group, Susanne M Hoffmann, Youla Azkarrula
| Asterism Info | |
| Native | الوزن |
|---|---|
| Translation | the weight |
| Position (2000) | |
| Right ascension | 107.0978502 |
| Declination | -26.39319958 |
| Area | 0 sq. deg. |
| Stars | |
| Bright stars | 1 |
| Bayer/Flamsteed stars | 1 |
| Stars brighter than 3.00m | 0 |
| Brightest star | Wezen (1.84m) |
| Taxonomy | |
| category of asterism | IAU-Star Name |
| IAU- constellations | CMa |
Wezen is a modern star name adopted by the International Astronomical Union in the IAU-Catalog of Star Names (IAU-CSN). Its origin is Arabic. It is the name of HIP 34444 (δ CMa, HR 2693) in constellation CMa.
Etymology and History
From the Arabic name al-wazn, for one of a pair of stars, the other one being hadari. Arabic authors ventured to identify these stars as α/β Cen or α/β Col, but exactly what two stars were originally intended, and the significance of their names, is unknown. As a common noun in Arabic, al-wazn means "the weight". "Wezen" was arbitrarily applied to δ CMa in recent times.
Mythology
IAU Working Group on Star Names
The name was adopted by the IAU WGSN on 2016/07/20.
Weblinks
- Website of the IAU WGSN: https://exopla.net/
Reference
- References (general)
- Kunitzsch, Paul; Smart, Tim (2006). A Dictionary of Modern star Names: A Short Guide to 254 Star Names and Their Derivations (2nd rev. ed.). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Sky Pub.
