Rasalnaqa

Authors: Susanne M Hoffmann, Youla Azkarrula

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Rasalnaqa profile card (CC BY Sadegh Faghanpour, OAE Iran).

Rasalnaqa

Asterism Info
Native	أس العقنقة
Translation	The Head of the She-Camel
Position (2000)
Right ascension	354.5341679
Declination	43.26807305
Area	0 sq. deg.
Stars
Bright stars	1
Bayer/Flamsteed stars	1
Stars brighter than 3.00m	0
Brightest star	Rasalnaqa (4.29m)
Taxonomy
category of asterism	IAU-Star Name
IAU- constellations	And

The Arabic term "Ras al Naqa" originially designated the asterism of three or four stars in the area that shaped the hand of classical Andromeda. al-Nāqa (الناقة) is the She-Camel that covered the area of Cassiopeia but its head is in the region of Andromeda.

It is the modern star name of ι And (HR 8965, HIP 116631).

Etymology and History

Rasalnaqa in a stickfigure (CC BY Sadegh Faghanpour, OAE Iran).

The Indigenous Arabian constellations of The Horse and The Camel next to the adopted Syrian constellation of the Love Goddess with a Fish (Andromeda) in an al-Sufi manuscript dating AH 519/ 1125 CE, copied by 'Ali bin 'Abd al-Jalil bin 'Ali bin Muhammad. Islamic Arts Biennale 2025 exhibition: of al-Faras al-Kamil and al-Naqa. (Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar. MS.2.1998), study by Emilie Savage-Smith (2013).

In the image, it looks as if the lady in the constellation of Andromeda "feeds" the dromedary: her hand really occupies the same space. In the Almagest, three stars (ι, κ, λ And) are listed in "the hand of Andromeda" but there is actually a fourth one: ψ Andromedae. These four seem to be depicted in the "Head of the She-Camel" in the earliest known manuscripts of al-Sufi (see image on the right).

IAU Working Group on Star Names

The name was discussed and adopted by the IAU WGSN in 2025.

Weblinks

• Website of the IAU WGSN: https://exopla.net/

Reference

• References (general)
• References (early modern)