Where did the names of the stars come from?

Of the total number of stars that can be observed with the naked eye, there are about 275 own names. The names of the stars were invented in different epochs, in different countries. Not all of them have reached our time in the original form, and it is not always clear why this or that luminary is called that way.

On the very ancient drawings, which depict the night sky, it can be seen that initially the name was only in the constellations. Especially bright stars were simply somehow labeled.

Later appeared the famous catalog of Ptolemy, in which 48 constellations were designated. Here already the heavenly bodies were numbered or the descriptive names of the stars were given . For example, in the description of the Big Dipper bucket, they looked like this: "a star on the back of a quadrilateral", "one on its side", "the first in the tail" and so on.

Only in the XVI century, the Italian astronomer Piccolomini began to denote them in Latin and Greek letters. The designation passed in alphabetical order in decreasing order of magnitude (brightness). The same method was used by the German astronomer Bayer. And the English astronomer Flamsteed added the ordinal numbers to the letter designation ("61 Cygnus").

Let's talk about how beautiful names of stars appeared, their brightest representatives. Of course, let's start with the main lighthouse - the Polar Star, this is how it is most often called today. Although there are about a hundred names, almost all of them are associated with its location. This is due to the fact that it points to the North Pole and is practically immobile. It seems that the star is simply attached to the sky, and all the other stars make their eternal movement around it.

It is because of its immobility that the North Star has become the main navigational reference point of the sky. In Russia, the names of the stars gave them a description: this luminary was called "Celestial Kolka", "Prikol-star", "Northern Star". In Mongolia, it was called the "Golden Cola", in Estonia - "The North Nail", in Yugoslavia - "Necretory" (the one that does not rotate). Khakas it is called "Khoskhar", it means "attached horse". And the Evenks called it "the hole of the sky."

Sirius is the brightest heavenly body for the observer from the Earth. The Egyptians have all the names of the stars poetic, that's what they called Sirius "The Beaming Star of the Nile", "The Tear of Isis", "The King of the Sun" or "Sotis". The Romans, however, this heavenly body received a rather prosaic name - "Sultry dog". This is due to the fact that when it appeared in the sky, the unbearable summer heat came.

Speka - the brightest of the constellation of the Virgin. Previously, it was called "Kolos", which is why Virgo is most often depicted with ears of corn. Perhaps this is due to the fact that when the sun is in Virgo, it is time to harvest.

Regulus - the main star of the constellation of Leo. In Latin it means "king". The name of this celestial body is more ancient than the constellation itself. He was so called by Ptolemy, as well as Babylonian and Arab astronomers. There is an assumption that it was for this star that the Egyptians were determined with the terms of field work.

Aldebaran is the main star of the constellation of Taurus. Translated from Arabic, its name means "walking after", since this star moves behind the Pleiades (the most beautiful scattered cluster of stars), it seems to be catching up with them.

Another of one of the brightest representatives, she is in the constellation of Kiel. Canopus is her name. The name of the heavenly body and the constellation itself has a long history. It was Canopus that was the guidebook of sailors already many thousands of years before our era, and today it is the main navigation luminary in the southern hemisphere.

Constellations, stars - their names they received back in antiquity. But even now they are fascinating with their radiance and remain a mystery to people.