Aries
Origin
Aries is one of the 12 constellations of the zodiac, located on the path the Sun appears to follow across the sky. Aries is north of the celestial equator between Pisces and Taurus.
Aries is one of the 48 constellations described by Ptolemy in the second century and has been depicted as a ram since late Bablonian times.
Bright Stars
Aries is a fairly dim constellation. The brightest star is called Hamal; it shines at magnitude 2.0 and lies 66 light-years from Earth. Hamal is an orange giant. The second-brightest star is Sheratan which has a visual magnitude of 2.6 and lies 58 light-years distant. Mesarthim shines at magnitude 3.9 but is actually a double star with two components separated by 7.8 arcseconds.
Photo of the constellation Aries produced by NOIRLab in collaboration with Eckhard Slawik, a German astrophotographer.
The annotations are from a standardized set of 88 western IAU constellations and stick figures from Sky & Telescope. Please find here a non-annotated version of the image.
Credit: E. Slawik/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/M. Zamani
Latin name
English name
Aries
Pronunciation
AIR-ease
Abbreviation
Ari
Notable Objects
NGC 772 is also known as the Fiddlehead Galaxy. This galaxy, found in Aries, shines at magnitude 10.3 and is visible through modest amateur telescopes. Photographs reveal an unusually long arm caused by tidal interaction with a nearby galaxy.
