sagittarius mythology
Obscured by clouds of dust, it cannot be observed in the visual bands, but is visible in radio, infrared and X-ray wavelengths. It lies at a distance of only 1,000 light years and has a radius of more than 9 light years, occupying more than 60 arc minutes of the apparent sky. It was discovered by the French astronomer Pierre Mchain in 1780. VX Sagittarii lies at an approximate distance of 5,150 light years from Earth. Sagittarius constellation, Baades Window and the Teapot, photo: NASA, ESA, Z. Levay (STScI) and A. Fujii. Chiron was a kind, talented, and gentle creature. It has an estimated age of about 220 million years. Before being assigned to Sagittarius, the star system was known as Beta Telescopii. Sagittarius is the 15th largest constellation in the sky. It has an apparent size of 4.75 by 4.75. It has an apparent magnitude of 9.28. As per Greek folklore, Sagittarius is a centaur. However, this does not make them cold . What's strange about this centaur is that it has wings, two heads, of which one is that of a panther and the other is a human head. The Red Spider Nebula is a planetary nebula that occupies an area of 1.5 arc minutes in the northwestern part of Sagittarius. But why were they immortalized in the stars? The clusters, Arches (upper right), Quintuplet (upper center), and the GC cluster (bottom center), contain massive stars that appear as very bright, point-like X-ray sources when winds from their surfaces collide with those from an orbiting companion. NGC 6559 is a star-forming region consisting of emission and reflection nebulae and dark absorption nebulae, lying about 5,000 light years from Earth. Image: ESO. Would you prefer to share this page with others by linking to it? The star is approximately 89.1 light years distant from Earth. The cluster occupies an area of 2 of apparent sky. It is a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way and headed for a collision with our galaxy. Messier 28 is a globular cluster located near Lambda Sagittarii (Kaus Borealis). Image: ESA/Hubble & NASA, acknowledgement: M. Novak. Satyrs did.) The last occultation occurred on September 3, 423. The cluster was first observed by Charles Messier in June 1764. (However, most viewers don't see an archer when they look at Sagittariusthe teapot shape is far easier to identify.) In Greek mythology, Sagittarius represents a centaur, a half human, half horse creature with the torso of a man and the body and four legs of a horse. Its name means divided into three lobes. NGC 6624 is another globular cluster in Sagittarius. Sometimes Sagittarius is wrongly identified as the centaur Chiron, represented by the constellation Centaurus. The constellation name Sagittarius is pronounced /sdtris/. Located in the Galactic centre region, the Pistol Star lies approximately 25,000 light years from our solar system. Messier 55 is another globular cluster in Sagittarius. Image: ESO. Phi Sagittarii is a B8 class giant approximately 231 light years from Earth. It is approximately 149 light years distant. It was discovered by the French astronomer Nicolas Louis de Lacaille in 1751 and included by Messier in his catalogue in 1778. It has a similar structure to the Small Magellanic Cloud, the dwarf galaxy in the constellation Tucana. The star is believed to have a debris disk, like Vega, the brightest star in the constellation Lyra. Edwin Hubble identified 15 variable stars in Barnards Galaxy, 11 of which were Cepheids, luminous variable stars that have a strong relationship between luminosity and pulsation period, which makes them excellent standard candles (objects with a known luminosity) for determining galactic and extragalactic distance scales. Once enough material was ejected, the stars luminous core was exposed and it began to produce ultraviolet radiation, exciting the surrounding gas to varying degrees and causing it to radiate in an attractive array of colours. Return from Sagittarius Myth to the Constellation Myths page. The nebulas appearance earned it the nickname Eye of Sauron Nebula. Also catalogued as ESO 456-67, the nebula was discovered by Rudolph Minkowski in 1946. It is also notable for being one of only four known globular clusters that contain a planetary nebula. It is less that 3 million years old, but it has shed a lot of its initial mass and is expected to end its life in a supernova or hypernova event in the next few million years. The image of the Peony Nebula star was taken by NASAs Spitzer Space Telescope in its naturally dusty region. The image was made from data obtained through four different filters (B, V, R, and H-alpha). They both were known to hunt with a bow and arrow (though this is a bit misleading as centaurs did not traditionally use a bow and arrow. The cluster is a relatively large and bright one, with an apparent magnitude of 7.42. First discovered by amateur Japanese astronomer, Yukio Sakurai, in 1996, and noted as a nova-like object, Sakurais discovery turned out to be far more interesting than the supernova he initially supposed it to be. It is one of the most metal-poor galaxies known. The Carina-Sagittarius Arm is particularly notable for containing a large number of H II regions, giant molecular clouds and young stars. The third star in the system is an O-type star with an apparent magnitude of 15.36. The cloud is about 600 light years wide and approximately 10,000 light years distant. This vast ball of ancient stars is located at a distance of about 17,000 light-years from Earth. Messier 75 is a globular star cluster about 67,500 light years from Earth. This image from the Wide Field Imager on the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at ESOs La Silla Observatory in Chile, shows the bright star cluster NGC 6520 and its neighbour, the strangely shaped dark cloud Barnard 86. The clouds have an ionized surface. It is an H II region, containing a stellar nursery full of embryonic stars. They have the head and torso of a man, but the bottom half of a hoofed beast. In mythology, Centaurs were hard drinkers, unreliable, misleading, crude, wild, and adulterous. It may look like something from The Lord of the Rings, but this fiery swirl is actually a planetary nebula known as ESO 456-67. Red Spider Nebula (NGC 6537), image: Judy Schmidt (CC BY 2.0). It has an apparent magnitude of 12.87. Located in the western part of Sagittarius, the cluster is surprisingly easy to see in binoculars and telescopes thanks to it being highly condensed in the center. He even invented the bow, according to Greek mythology. Sagittarius in Mythology The story of Sagittarius originates from Greek mythology, specifically that of Chiron, an immortal centaur who acted as teacher to many ancient Greek heroes. When Ehman discovered it, he printed his findings out, circled the signal and wrote Wow! next to it, which is how the signal got its name. At the bottom centre is a rather unremarkable smudge of red which is in fact a rare and valuable object. The Sagittarius symbol, or glyph is designed to depict the Centaur or Archer. The cluster was discovered by William Herschel on May 24, 1784. It is located about 18,000 light years away from Earth in the Sagittarius constellation. It is a blue variable star that is about four million times as luminous as our Sun and 120-200 times as massive. The supernova remnant Sagittarius A East is about 25 light years wide and appears to have originated in an event that occurred between 35,000 and 100,000 years ago. Each sign is represented by an animal or a mythological figure. The Gamma designation used to be shared by two star systems in Sagittarius, Gamma-1 and Gamma-2, which were separated by 0.86 in the sky. It is a suspected binary star, even though a companion has never been confirmed. The cluster is believed to be only 2.5 million years old. The star is classified as a semiregular variable of the SRc type. It lies at an estimated distance of 50,000 light years from Earth on the other side of our galaxy. (The other three are Messier 15 in the constellation Pegasus, Palomar 6 in Ophiuchus and NGC 6441 in Scorpius.). It has an apparent magnitude of 4.27 and is approximately 137 light years distant. A transiting planet was spotted orbiting the magnitude 16 eclipsing variable star OGLE-TR-10 (G2V) in 2002. This huddling effect produces the denser, brighter centres characteristic of core-collapsed clusters. OGLE-2006-BLG-109L (spectral class M0V) has two known exoplanets, suspected analogs of Jupiter and Saturn, discovered in 2008. NGC 6638 is a class VI globular cluster occupying an area of 2 arc minutes about half a degree to the east of Lambda Sagittarii. The brightest stars in the cluster are 16th magnitude. It was discovered by William Herschel on June 24, 1784. The Sagittarius Cluster is one of the brightest globular star clusters in the sky. The constellations Sagittarius and Centaurus are both supposed to represent a centaur, a creature with the upper torso of a man and the body and legs of a horse . Why Chiron gets credit as the figure in Sagittarius mythology is a bit of a mystery. The last time this happened was on November 19, 1984, when Venus passed in front of the star, eclipsing it. The system is notable for being the source of one of the most rapid superluminal (faster than light) jets in our galaxy. What is the flower of Sagittarius? It was discovered by William Herschel on May 28, 1786. The Trifid Nebula is a bright, colourful emission/reflection nebula in Sagittarius. It cannot be seen visually, but must be observed in radio, X-ray and infrared bands. The cluster was discovered by William Herschel on 24 June, 1784. Others suggest that clusters like Terzan 7 only have enough material to form one batch of stars, or that perhaps its youthfulness has prevented it from yet forming another generation. It is one of only four star systems known to be hydrogen-deficient, which makes it difficult to classify U Sgr. The Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy has an apparent magnitude of 4.5 and is approximately 65,000 light years distant. Sagittarius constellation map by IAU and Sky&Telescope magazine. Messier 28 was the first globular star cluster in which a milisecond pulsar (a pulsar with a rotational period between 1 and 10 miliseconds) was discovered in 1986. It has an apparent magnitude of 9 and lies 9,450 light years from Earth. It does not really have the structure of a spiral. Other than Virgo, the Sagittarius myth is probably the most commonly misinterpreted of all of the constellation myths. The Quintuplet Cluster contains more Wolf-Rayet stars than any other cluster known and several notable luminous blue variables, including the Pistol Star, V4650 Sagittarii and the runaway star V4998 Sagittarii. Its estimated age is between 3 and 4.5 million years. The constellation of Sagittarius (which literally means "archer" in Latin, per Britannica) is said to be a centaur or satyr holding a bow and arrow, according to Gods and Monsters. It has an apparent magnitude of 12 and with a linear radius of 160 light years it occupies 7.3 of the apparent sky. The first magnetar to be identified, in 2013, was SGR J17452900 or PSR J1745-2900, the soft gamma repeater orbiting a black hole in Sagittarius A*. It is between 18,000 and 19,000 light years distant and has an apparent magnitude of 7.66. Centaurs were often associated with the abduction (or attempted abduction . NGC 6818 is a magnitude 10 planetary nebula in Sagittarius. The cluster has an apparent magnitude of 10.65 and lies 25,800 light years from Earth. The Sagittarius Dwarf is believed to already have orbited the Milky Way about 10 times in the last billion years or so, and it still appears to have coherence as an elongated ellipse despite being torn apart by enormous tidal forces as a result of the interaction. Having this many shining stars piled on top of one another from our perspective makes globular clusters a popular target for amateur skywatchers and scientists alike. M21 has an apparent magnitude of 6.5 and lies at an approximate distance of 4,250 light years from Earth. It is one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy and remains one of the 88 modern constellations. The significance of the name is unknown, except that it is a proper name. It can be observed through a small telescope and is a popular deep sky object among amateur astronomers. It was originally discovered by Charles Messier in 1764. The star was named after the shape of the nebula it illuminates, the Pistol Nebula. The cluster has an apparent magnitude of 11.29 and lies at a distance of 24,100 light years from Earth. The star cannot be observed in visual bands because less than a billionth of its light in the visible spectrum reaches us, which translates to about 35th visual magnitude. The Box Nebula, catalogued as NGC 6445, is a planetary nebula with a visual magnitude of 11.2. M54 is believed to belong to the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy. Epsilon Sagittarii is a binary star approximately 143 light years distant. It lies at an approximate distance of 50,000 light years from Earth. Image: ESO/VPHAS+ team. NGC 6565 is a planetary nebula, a cloud of gas expelled by a central star in its final stages, located about 14,000 light years away in Sagittarius. The archer is usually identified as the centaur Chiron, though sometimes held to be a similar figure known as Crotus, a satyr. The end of this star may only last mere moments on a cosmological timescale, but this stars demise is still quite lengthy by our standards, lasting tens of thousands of years! At the centre of the Lagoon Nebula, there is a structure known as the Hourglass Nebula (not the same object as the famous Hourglass Nebula, which is located in the constellation Musca). The proper names of stars that have been officially approved by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) are Ainalrami, Albaldah, Alnasl, Arkab Posterior, Arkab Prior, Ascella, Belel, Gumala, Kaus Australis, Kaus Borealis, Kaus Media, Nunki, Pincoya, Polis, Rukbat, Sika, and Terebellum.
