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Kumeyaay Astronomy
Kumeyaay astronomy or cosmology (Kumeyaay: ''My Uuyow'', "sky knowledge") comprises the astronomical knowledge of the Kumeyaay people, a Native American group whose traditional homeland occupies what is now Southern California in the United States and adjacent parts of northern Baja California in Mexico. A deeply rooted cosmological belief system was developed and followed by the Kumeyaay civilization based on this knowledge including the computing of time (Kumeyaay Mat’taam). The first evidence of astronomical observations and visual registration was discovered in the El Vallecito archeological zone. The "Men in a square" rupestric painting located at El Diablito area of El Vallecito depicted a square that aligns with sunlight on the Fall equinox. These paintings were made by the Kumeyaay people, possibly during nomadic travels. Kumeyaay sand paintings and rock art modeled the passage of the sun, moon, and constellations. Observation areas were made by the Kumeyaay to watch a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kumeyaay Language
Kumeyaay (Kumiai), also known as Central Diegueño, Kamia, and Campo, is the Native American language spoken by the Kumeyaay people of southern San Diego and Imperial counties in California. Hinton (1994:28) suggested a conservative estimate of 50 native speakers of Kumeyaay. A more liberal estimate (including speakers of Ipai and Tipai), supported by the results of the Census 2000, is 110 people in the US, including 15 persons under the age of 18. There were 377 speakers reported in the 2010 Mexican census, including 88 who called their language "Cochimi". Kumeyaay belongs to the Yuman language family and to the Delta–California branch of that family. Kumeyaay and its neighbors, Ipai to the north and Tipai to the south, were often considered to be dialects of a single Diegueño language, but the current consensus among linguists seems to be that at least three distinct languages are present within the dialect chain (e.g., Langdon 1990). Confusingly, Kumeyaay is commonly u ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canis Minor
Canis Minor is a small constellation in the northern celestial hemisphere. In the second century, it was included as an asterism, or pattern, of two stars in Ptolemy's 48 constellations, and it is counted among the 88 modern constellations. Its name is Latin for "lesser dog", in contrast to Canis Major, the "greater dog"; both figures are commonly represented as following the constellation of Orion the hunter. Canis Minor contains only two stars brighter than the fourth magnitude, Procyon (Alpha Canis Minoris), with a magnitude of 0.34, and Gomeisa (Beta Canis Minoris), with a magnitude of 2.9. The constellation's dimmer stars were noted by Johann Bayer, who named eight stars including Alpha and Beta, and John Flamsteed, who numbered fourteen. Procyon is the eighth- brightest star in the night sky, as well as one of the closest. A yellow-white main sequence star, it has a white dwarf companion. Gomeisa is a blue-white main sequence star. Luyten's Star is a ninth-ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
History Of Astronomy
Astronomy is the oldest of the natural sciences, dating back to antiquity, with its origins in the religious, mythological, cosmological, calendrical, and astrological beliefs and practices of prehistory: vestiges of these are still found in astrology, a discipline long interwoven with public and governmental astronomy. It was not completely separated in Europe (see astrology and astronomy) during the Copernican Revolution starting in 1543. In some cultures, astronomical data was used for astrological prognostication. Early history Early cultures identified celestial objects with gods and spirits. They related these objects (and their movements) to phenomena such as rain, drought, seasons, and tides. It is generally believed that the first astronomers were priests, and that they understood celestial objects and events to be manifestations of the divine, hence early astronomy's connection to what is now called astrology. A 32,500-year-old carved ivory mammoth tusk could c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cultural Astronomy
Cultural astronomy, sometimes called the study of Astronomy in Culture, has been described as investigating "the diversity of ways in which cultures, both ancient and modern, perceive celestial objects and integrate them into their view of the world." As such, it encompassed the interdisciplinary fields studying the astronomies of current or ancient societies and cultures. It developed from the two interdisciplinary fields of archaeoastronomy, the study of the use of astronomy and its role in ancient cultures and civilizations, and ethnoastronomy, "a closely allied research field which merges astronomy, textual scholarship, ethnology, and the interpretation of ancient iconography for the purpose of reconstructing lifeways, astronomical techniques, and rituals." It is also related to historical astronomy (analyzing historical astronomical data), history of astronomy (understanding and study and evolution of the discipline of astronomy over the course of human knowledge) and history ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Piscis Austrinus
Piscis Austrinus is a constellation in the southern celestial hemisphere. The name is Latin for "the southern fish", in contrast with the larger constellation Pisces, which represents a pair of fish. Before the 20th century, it was also known as Piscis Notius. Piscis Austrinus was one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy, and it remains one of the 88 modern constellations. The stars of the modern constellation Grus once formed the "tail" of Piscis Austrinus. In 1597 (or 1598), Petrus Plancius carved out a separate constellation and named it after the crane. It is a faint constellation, containing only one star brighter than 4th magnitude: Fomalhaut, which is 1st magnitude and the 18th-brightest star in the night sky. Fomalhaut is surrounded by a circumstellar disk, and possibly hosts a planet. Other objects contained within the boundaries of the constellation include Lacaille 9352, the brightest red dwarf star in the night sky (though still t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hydra (constellation)
Hydra is the largest of the 88 modern constellations, measuring 1303 square degrees, and also the longest at over 100 degrees. Its southern end borders Libra and Centaurus and its northern end borders Cancer. It was included among the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd century astronomer Ptolemy. Commonly represented as a water snake, it straddles the celestial equator. History and mythology Western mythology The Greek constellation of Hydra is an adaptation of a Babylonian constellation: the MUL.APIN includes a "serpent" constellation (MUL.DINGIR.MUŠ) that loosely corresponds to Hydra. It is one of two Babylonian "serpent" constellations (the other being the origin of the Greek Serpens), a mythological hybrid of serpent, lion and bird. The shape of Hydra resembles a twisting snake, and features as such in some Greek myths. One myth associates it with a water snake that a crow served Apollo in a cup when it was sent to fetch water; Apollo saw through the fraud, an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Corvus (constellation)
Corvus is a small constellation in the Southern Celestial Hemisphere. Its name means "crow" in Latin. One of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy, it depicts a raven, a bird associated with stories about the god Apollo, perched on the back of Hydra the water snake. The four brightest stars, Gamma, Delta, Epsilon, and Beta Corvi, form a distinctive quadrilateral in the night sky. With an apparent magnitude of 2.59, Gamma Corvi—also known as Gienah—is the brightest star in the constellation. It is an aging blue giant around four times as massive as the Sun. The young star Eta Corvi has been found to have two debris disks. Three star systems have exoplanets, and a fourth planetary system is unconfirmed. TV Corvi is a dwarf nova—a white dwarf and brown dwarf in very close orbit. History and mythology In the Babylonian star catalogues dating from at least 1100 BCE, what later became known as Corvus was called the Raven (MUL.UGA.MUSHEN). As w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Orion's Belt
Orion's Belt or the Belt of Orion, also known as the Three Kings or Three Sisters, is an asterism in the constellation Orion. It consists of the three bright stars Alnitak, Alnilam and Mintaka. Looking for Orion's Belt is the easiest way to locate Orion in the night sky. The stars are more or less evenly spaced in a nearly straight line, and so can be visualized as the belt of the eponymous hunter's clothing. They are best viewed in the early night sky during the Northern Winter/Southern Summer, in particular, the month of January at around 9:00 pm. Component stars The names of the three stars come from Arabic. () means " string of pearls" or is related to the word ("sapphire"); spelling variants include and , with all three evidently being mistakes in transliteration or copy errors. Alnitak Alnitak (ζ Orionis) is a triple star system at the eastern end of Orion's belt and is 1,260 light-years from the Earth. Alnitak B is a 4th-magnitude B-type star which orbits ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aquila (constellation)
Aquila is a constellation on the celestial equator. Its name is Latin for 'eagle' and it represents the bird that carried Zeus/Jupiter's thunderbolts in Greek-Roman mythology. Its brightest star, Altair, is one vertex of the Summer Triangle asterism. The constellation is best seen in the northern summer, as it is located along the Milky Way. Because of this location, many clusters and nebulae are found within its borders, but they are dim and galaxies are few. History Aquila was one of the 48 constellations described by the second-century astronomer Ptolemy. It had been earlier mentioned by Eudoxus in the fourth century BC and Aratus in the third century BC. It is now one of the 88 constellations defined by the International Astronomical Union. The constellation was also known as ''Vultur volans'' (the flying vulture) to the Romans, not to be confused with ''Vultur cadens'' which was their name for Lyra. It is often held to represent the eagle which held Zeus's/Jupiter's ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Virgo (constellation)
Virgo is one of the constellations of the zodiac. Its name is Latin for maiden, and its old astronomical symbol is (♍︎). Lying between Leo to the west and Libra to the east, it is the second-largest constellation in the sky (after Hydra) and the largest constellation in the zodiac. The ecliptic intersects the celestial equator within this constellation and Pisces. Underlying these technical two definitions, the sun passes directly overhead of the equator, within this constellation, at the September equinox. Virgo can be easily found through its brightest star, Spica. Location Virgo is prominent in the spring sky in the Northern Hemisphere, visible all night in March and April. As the largest zodiac constellation, the Sun takes 44 days to pass through it, longer than any other. From 1990 and until 2062, this will take place from September 16 to October 30. It is located in the third quadrant of the Southern Hemisphere (SQ3) and can be seen at latitudes between +80° ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boötes
Boötes ( ) is a constellation in the northern sky, located between 0° and +60° declination, and 13 and 16 hours of right ascension on the celestial sphere. The name comes from la, Boōtēs, which comes from grc-gre, Βοώτης, Boṓtēs ' herdsman' or ' plowman' (literally, ' ox-driver'; from ''boûs'' ' cow'). One of the 48 constellations described by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy, Boötes is now one of the 88 modern constellations. It contains the fourth-brightest star in the night sky, the orange giant Arcturus. Epsilon Boötis, or Izar, is a colourful multiple star popular with amateur astronomers. Boötes is home to many other bright stars, including eight above the fourth magnitude and an additional 21 above the fifth magnitude, making a total of 29 stars easily visible to the naked eye. History and mythology In ancient Babylon, the stars of Boötes were known as SHU.PA. They were apparently depicted as the god Enlil, who was the leader of the Bab ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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