What is the constellation Aries?
Aries (Aries according to the Latin name of the International Astronomical Union), the sheep, with the symbol Aries, is one of the constellations of the zodiac, located between Pisces to the west and Taurus to the east.
Aries: Main stars
Aries stars They are weak, except Halmal (α Arietis) and Sharatan (β Arietis). Among the main stars of Aries, there are Mesarthim (γ) and boots (δ).
Hamal (α Arietis)
Hamal (α Arietis), name that means the xot in Arabic and which therefore designates itself in the entire constellation, it is the brightest star in Aries. Is a yellow giant15 times larger than the Sun and 90 times brighter.
Sheratan (β Arietis)
Sheratan (β Arietis) It is the second brightest star in the constellation Aries. Is a White Star of the main sequence, only twice as massive as the Sun. It is also a double star: its companion, a star of the same mass as the Sun, was detected by Doppler analysis more than a century ago. Their orbit is extremely eccentric (0.88), the two stars are very close to each other, (0.08) AU when they are closest, 1.2 AU when they are farthest, and they circle one above the other at 107 days. The two stars are thus virtually inseparable by the telescope and there is an interferometer to separate them.
Mesarthim (γ Arietis)
Mesarthim (γ Arietis) It is not the third star in the constellation, it is the fourth. Its rank within the Bayer designation comes from its proximity to Hamal and Sheratan.
Mesartim It is a double star. The primary, γ 2 Arietis, is magnitude 4.75. Its companion, γ 1 Ari (its «1» comes from its location, to the west of «2», is of magnitude 3.38. They are less than 500 AU apart and close to each other in 5,000 years.
The spectral type of γ 2 Arietis is «A1p», from «particular»: This star has an extremely intense magnetic field, more than 1,000 times greater than that of the Earth.
53 Arietis
53 Arietis, a blue-white star In appearance banal, of the apparent magnitude 6.13, it is about 750 light-years away, it is one of the three «wandering stars» («runaway stars» in English), which move very quickly through space. The other two stars are μ Columbae and AE Aurigae, and all three appear to be fleeing at 100 km/s from the same point in the Orion Nebula. According to one hypothesis, these stars would have originally been part of a multiple system that would have been disaggregated by the supernova explosion of one of the members, 3 million years ago, which would have projected the three other stars in different directions.
Other stars
Without being a very extensive constellation, Aries It has a large number of stars visible to the naked eye without being particularly bright. Consequently, the designations are quite numerous: proper name (like boots, δ Arietis, fourth star of the constellation), Bayer designation (ε Arietis, sixth), Flamsteed designation (41 Arietis, third star, brighter than Mesarthim) , Henry Draper catalog (HD 20644, fifth star).
Celestial bodies Aries
In this constellation there are few objects, and they are all dimly luminous. The galaxies NGC 697 (in the northwest of β), NGC 772 (in the southeast of β), NGC 972 (in the north of the constellation) and NGC 1156 (in the northwest of δ) are found.
History and mythology of Aries
In Greek mythology, Aries It would represent the ram, the golden fleece that inspired the saga of Jason.
The king Athamas had two children Frixo and Heleof his marriage with Nefele. After the death of his mother, Athamante remarried Ino, with whom he also had two children. Queen Ino wanted her children to inherit the throne, so Phrixus and Hele had to be gotten rid of. To do this she devised a wicked ploy. He lit a fire under the ground of the granaries, so when the wheat was sown the roasted grain was not born. Faced with the threat of famine, the king sent emissaries to consult the Oracle of Delphi. When the emissaries returned, Queen Ino bribed them to say what she wanted: that the gods demanded the sacrifice of Phrixus and Helle. The god Hermes sent the children a winged ram with golden wool. Riding on the ram we will travel towards the east, but Helle fell into the sea, which was named Hellespont in honor of Helle. This accident caused Frixo to lose confidence in the flying ram. He landed and continued on foot with him to the forest of Ares to Colchis. There he was welcomed by King Aeetes, and married the king’s daughter. As a token of gratitude, Phrixus sacrificed the ram and offered the golden fleece to the king, who hung it on an oak tree in the sacred forest of Ares.
It seems that the Babylonians, the Greeks, the Persians, and the Egyptians all called the constellation «the Marrano.»
Aries It was also the first constellation of the Zodiac when it was established more than 2,000 years ago: due to the precession of the equinoxes, the spring equinox was at that time located in Aries (currently in Pisces).
The north of Aries It was called Boreal fly until the 19th century. Its main star was 41 Arietis (which explains the absence of a Greek letter to designate this star).