I discovered the following errata page, published in the Uranometria Argentina, hasn't been incorporated in the various transcriptions:

I'll be updating the data for Vizier and http://www.uranometriaargentina.com/ in due course.

Uranometria Argentina: a Labour of Love

We have Frederick Pilcher to thank for the Uranometria Argentina making its way on to the web, and subsequently on to Vizier. What most people won't realize was that he entered all the data (original, as well as modern magnitudes and catalog references) by hand! In his own words:

After some investigation I learned that there was a copy of the original Uranometria Argentina at the library of Steward Observatory, University of Arizona, and arranged with the library staff to photocopy the entire tabulation plus a few additional pages of explanation. The photocopies I took home to type character by character into a plain text file, all 7700+ lines of data. Likewise all the modern data were added by hand. The entire task, fitted into spare time, required more than a year. I did exhaustive proofreading and found most of the typographical mistakes before ever putting the text file on-line.

Likewise by hand I entered the Gould numbers on to personal star charts, went out at
night, and using binoculars identified most of the Uranometria Argentina stars north of declination -50 degrees.

A remarkable effort. I came along later and helped with further proofreading, and the resulting data was loaded into Vizier. But without Frederick's herculean perseverance, none of it would have been possible. Thank you Frederick!

Uranometria Argentina: Atlas

The Uranometria Argentina catalogue was accompanied by a Star Atlas, which you can view here (courtesy of Google Translate), or here if you're comfortable in Spanish.

Gould update at Vizier

Thanks to François Ochsenbein from CDS/Simbad and his helpful team, the Gould Catalogue at Vizier (http://vizier.u-strasbg.fr/viz-bin/VizieR?-source=V%2F135) has been updated. The Gould Name has been added to the search results and the data record, as well as the original 1875.0 coordinates from the catalogue.

Uranometria Argentina entry for 82 G Erindani

This rectifies any potential ambiguity that existed previously with Flamsteed numbers with stars such as 33 G. Librae (which does not equal 33 Librae). How Gould's Uranometria Argentina came to be transcribed in the first place is a remarkable story in itself, which I will relate shortly in another entry.

Gould Designations: G. or no G. ?

I had a disagreement a while back with a scientist/astronomer about Gould numbers. Do Gould Designations have a G. or not? (e.g. 82 G. Eridani). He claimed he'd never even heard of the G., and felt that few people would be, or would want to be.

Historically, the G has always been present. I can also say that all atlases and publications I've come across include the G (his put-down of Sky & Telescope as publications for amateurs--what's with that?). So I said, as I still believe, that the G. is correct.

But I've been thinking. If the G. were dropped, it would be 'incorrect', but perhaps it would lead to Gould numbers being more popular. Pithy is good. Even though the G. is correct, maybe for the future they should be dropped.  33 G. Librae would have to keep the G. (33 Librae, a Flamsteed designation, already exists), but in most cases it could be done.

Thinking about it.

Lost Star Profile: Omicron Octantis (ο Oct)

I thought I would start to profile some "Lost Stars", in the sense of Morton Wagman's book of that name. These are stars that, for one reason or another, have temporarily 'lost' the names that they once had.

Omicron Octantis is marked. Sigma, the Pole Star, is the 2nd
star to the 'N-E'.

Omicron Octantis is a blue subgiant (B9.5IV) about 550 pc away. In Octans, most catalogues and atlases omit Omicron, but it does exist. It's HD 1348, and it's very close to the South Celestial pole. In fact, it used to be even closer, which is probably why it was given a Greek letter even though its magnitude is only 7.2V.

It was named in Rumker's catalogue, but Benjamin Gould obviously accepted the designation, for when he came to assign the Greek letters that hadn't yet been used, he omitted omicron. However, it was too faint for inclusion in Gould's catalogue, and too faint for the Bright Star Catalogue or its supplement, so it tends to get forgotten, even by editors of atlases where the magnitude limit is far fainter. Hopefully, they won't make the same mistake in the future!

Gould Numbers

John Flamsteed, the first Astronomer Royal, assigned numbers (known as Flamsteed numbers) to bright stars in each constellation, but he did so only for stars that he could see from London. Because of this, there are no Flamsteed number assigned within about 65 degrees of the South Celestial pole.

Benjamin Gould later did for the Southern Hemisphere what John Flamsteed did for the North. In his Uranometria Argentina (1879), he numbered thousands of stars south of +10 degrees N. Several of these have been in use ever since (think 82 G. Eridani), and they can be distinguished from Flamsteed numbers by the character G that follows the number. Though as you will see by the link to 82 Eri above, often the G somehow disappears!

In recent times the Uranometria Argentina hasn't been widely available, but that has all changed. Frederick Pilcher has transcribed the entire catalogue and published it at http://www.uranometriaargentina.com/. Wikipedia is also slowly being updated to include these designations.

So next time you're tempted to use a long catalogue number for an 'unnamed' star in the far south, check Gould's catalogue first.

Alpha Leonis Minoris (alpha LMi)

Okay, here's a prime example of what I'm talking about. The above designation seems clear enough: the brightest (alpha) star in the constellation Leo Minor (Leonis Minoris, LMi for short). Except you won't find it in any atlas.

Francis Baily was a British astronomer in the first half of the 19th century. He did many great things, but he was a scrooge with Greek letters. He lettered a few constellations that Bayer hadn't already done, but Baily would only add one if the star's magnitude was 4.5 or brighter. This was an idiosyncratic decision, because Bayer, who started everything off, was far more generous than that.

But inexplicably, Baily omitted Alpha in Leo Minor. He assigned a Beta (magnitude 4.2), but the brightest star Alpha (magnitude 3.8) he left unlettered. This was surely an oversight, given his stated objective, but in over 160 years since then, no one has corrected the oversight. Bode (1801) gave it the letter o, but this is confusing, and some atlases have called it omicron, the Greek letter, by mistake.

Truly. In 2010, we are still without an Alpha.

It's not hard to rectify. Gould would surely have fixed it if it had been within his purview, but Leo Minor is too far north to be included in his catalogue (Gould lettered stars of 6th magnitude or brighter). How about we finally put things right?

• Alpha: 46 LMi (3.8V)
• Beta: 31 LMi (4.2V)
• Gamma: 21 LMi (4.5V)

There we go, the three brightest stars in Leo Minor now have letters, as they should have all along. I may assign some more, but I will be scientific about it and check the surrounding constellations to see what magnitude limit to use. I'll let you know!

The 3 brightest stars of Leo Minor. From L to R, what should be: α, β, γ.

A History of Modern Star Designations

(condensed, with tongue slightly in cheek)

In the 1603, Bayer assigned Greek letters to stars in each constellation, but some were so badly drawn, you couldn’t tell what star he meant. Flamsteed tried to fix things up, but he was missing the catalogue that went with the atlas, and he only made things worse.

Then Lacaille mapped the southern constellations and used so many letters, people couldn’t discriminate the ο with the o, the χ with the x, and atlases still get them confused (I kid you not!). Bode added some designations, but people forgot most of them. Baily spent considerable effort tracking down Flamsteed's errors, but not everyone listened to him. Argelander reckoned if he couldn’t see a star, it didn’t deserve a designation--so he removed it, no matter what Baily said. Heis had better eyesight, but he sided with his buddy anyway. Gould then removed some more designations, and re-added others had deleted...

Finally, in 1930, the IAU stepped in and defined the Constellation boundaries once and for all. But they didn't think to standardize the nomenclature of stars at the same time, so we're left with a mess where stars designated Norma are in Scorpio, stars designated as being in Orion are in Monoceros. Astronomers and cartographers follow whatever convention they see fit to. And they call astronomy a science! ☺