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Volans (Chinese Astronomy)
The modern constellation Volans is not included in the Three Enclosures and Twenty-Eight Mansions system of traditional Chinese uranography because its stars are too far south for observers in China to know about them prior to the introduction of Western star charts. Based on the work of Xu Guangqi and the German Jesuit missionary Johann Adam Schall von Bell in the late Ming Dynasty, this constellation has been classified as one of the 23 Southern Asterisms (近南極星區, ''Jìnnánjíxīngōu'') under the name Flying Fish (飛魚, ''Fēiyú''). The name of the western constellation in modern Chinese is 飛魚座 (''fēi yú zuò''), which means "the flying fish constellation". Stars The map of Chinese constellation in constellation Volans area consists of : See also *Chinese astronomy *Traditional Chinese star names *Chinese constellations Traditional Chinese astronomy has a system of dividing the celestial sphere into asterisms or constellations, known as "officials" ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Volans
Volans is a constellation in the southern sky. It represents a flying fish; its name is a shortened form of its original name, Piscis Volans. Volans was one of twelve constellations created by Petrus Plancius from the observations of Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman and it first appeared on a 35-cm (14") diameter celestial globe published in 1597 (or 1598) in Amsterdam by Plancius with Jodocus Hondius. The first depiction of this constellation in a celestial atlas was in Johann Bayer's ''Uranometria'' of 1603. History Volans is one of the 12 constellations that were introduced by the Dutch navigators Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman in the late 16th century. It was first depicted on Petrus Plancius’ globe in 1598. Plancius called the constellation ''Vliegendenvis'' (flying fish). In 1603, Johann Bayer included the constellation in his star atlas ''Uranometria'' under the name Piscis Volans, the flying fish. John Herschel proposed shrinking the n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Three Enclosures
Traditional Chinese astronomy has a system of dividing the celestial sphere into asterisms or constellations, known as "officials" ( Chinese ''xīng guān''). The Chinese asterisms are generally smaller than the constellations of Hellenistic tradition. The Song dynasty (13th-century) Suzhou planisphere shows a total of 283 asterisms, comprising a total of 1,565 individual stars. The asterisms are divided into four groups, the Twenty-Eight Mansions (, ''Èrshíbā Xiù'') along the ecliptic, and the Three Enclosures of the northern sky. The southern sky was added as a fifth group in the late Ming dynasty based on European star charts, comprising an additional 23 asterisms. The Three Enclosures (, ''Sān Yuán'') include the Purple Forbidden Enclosure, which is centered on the north celestial pole and includes those stars which could be seen year-round,Needham, J.Astronomy in Ancient and Medieval China. ''Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London''. Serie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Twenty-Eight Mansions
The Twenty-Eight Mansions (), also called or , are part of the Chinese constellations system. They can be considered as the equivalent to the Zodiac, zodiacal constellations in Western astronomy, though the Twenty-eight Mansions reflect the movement of the Moon through a Lunar month, sidereal month rather than the Sun in a tropical year. The lunar mansion system was in use in other parts of East Asia, such as ancient Japan; the ''Bansenshūkai'', written by Fujibayashi Yasutake, mentions the system several times and includes an image of the twenty-eight mansions. A similar system, called nakshatra, is used in traditional Indian astronomy. Overview Ancient Chinese astronomers divided the sky ecliptic into four regions, collectively known as the Four Symbols, each assigned a mysterious animal. They are Azure Dragon (青龍) on the east, Black Tortoise (玄武) on the north, White Tiger (mythology), White Tiger (白虎) on the west, and Vermilion Bird (朱雀) on the south. E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Traditional Chinese Star Names
Chinese star names (Chinese language, Chinese: , ''xīng míng'') are named according to ancient Chinese astronomy and Chinese astrology, astrology. The sky is divided into Chinese constellations, star mansions (, ''xīng xiù'', also translated as "lodges") and asterisms (, ''xīng guān''). The ecliptic is divided into four sectors that are associated with the Four Symbols, guardians in Chinese mythology, and further into 28 mansions. Stars around the north celestial pole are grouped into three enclosures (, ''yuán''). The system of 283 asterisms under the Chinese constellations, Three Enclosures and Twenty-Eight Mansions was established by Chen Zhuo of the Three Kingdoms period, who synthesized ancient constellations and the asterisms created by early astronomers Shi Shen, Gan De and Wuxian (Shang dynasty), Wuxian. Since the Han dynasty, Han and Jin dynasty (266–420), Jin dynasties, stars have been given reference numbers within their asterisms in a system similar to the Bayer ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xu Guangqi
Xu Guangqi or Hsü Kuang-ch'i (April 24, 1562– November 8, 1633), also known by his baptismal name Paul or Paul Siu, was a Chinese agronomist, astronomer, mathematician, scholar-bureaucrat, politician, and writer during the late Ming dynasty. Xu was appointed by the Chinese Emperor in 1629 to be the leader of the Chongzhen calendar, Shixian calendar reform, which he embarked on with the assistance of Jesuits. Xu was a colleague and collaborator of the Italian Jesuits Matteo Ricci and Sabatino de Ursis and assisted their translation of several classic Western texts into Chinese, including part of Euclid's ''Euclid's Elements, Elements''. He was also the author of the ''Nong Zheng Quan Shu'', a treatise on agriculture. He is one of the "Three Pillars of Chinese Catholicism". The Roman Catholic Church considers him a Servant of God, one of the stages towards formal sainthood. On April 15, 2011, Holy See, Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi announced the start of a beatification ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johann Adam Schall Von Bell
Johann Adam Schall von Bell (1 May 1591 – 15 August 1666) was a German Jesuit, astronomer and instrument-maker. He spent most of his life as a missionary in China (where he is remembered as "Tang Ruowang") and became an adviser to the Shunzhi Emperor of the Qing dynasty. Life Schall von Bell was born to noble parents in Cologne or nearby Lüftelberg (today part of Meckenheim) in the Holy Roman Empire. After he graduated from the Jesuit Gymnasium in Cologne he moved to Rome and studied subjects such as mathematics and astronomy at the Collegium Germanicum. In 1611 he joined the Society of Jesus and continued his education at the Gregorianum. In 1618 he left for China on a Portuguese ship with a group of missionaries under the lead of Nicolas Trigault. The next year the group reached the Portuguese trading port of Macau where Schall von Bell spent some time learning Chinese. He started missionary work inside China in 1622, but allegedly his success was limited. He p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ming Dynasty
The Ming dynasty, officially the Great Ming, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol Empire, Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming was the last imperial dynasty of China ruled by the Han people, the majority ethnic group in China. Although the primary capital of Beijing fell in 1644 to a rebellion led by Li Zicheng (who established the short-lived Shun dynasty), numerous rump state, rump regimes ruled by remnants of the House of Zhu, Ming imperial family, collectively called the Southern Ming, survived until 1662. The Ming dynasty's founder, the Hongwu Emperor (1368–1398), attempted to create a society of self-sufficient rural communities ordered in a rigid, immobile system that would guarantee and support a permanent class of soldiers for his dynasty: the empire's standing army exceeded one million troops and the naval history of China, navy's dockyards in Nanjing were the largest in the world. H ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chinese Constellations
Traditional Chinese astronomy has a system of dividing the celestial sphere into asterisms or constellations, known as "officials" ( Chinese ''xīng guān''). The Chinese asterisms are generally smaller than the constellations of Hellenistic tradition. The Song dynasty (13th-century) Suzhou planisphere shows a total of 283 asterisms, comprising a total of 1,565 individual stars. The asterisms are divided into four groups, the Twenty-Eight Mansions (, ''Èrshíbā Xiù'') along the ecliptic, and the Three Enclosures of the northern sky. The southern sky was added as a fifth group in the late Ming dynasty based on European star charts, comprising an additional 23 asterisms. The Three Enclosures (, ''Sān Yuán'') include the Purple Forbidden Enclosure, which is centered on the north celestial pole and includes those stars which could be seen year-round,Needham, J.Astronomy in Ancient and Medieval China. ''Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London''. Ser ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alpha Volantis
Alpha Volantis (Alpha Vol), Latinized from α Volantis, is a binary star system located in the southern constellation Volans. It has an apparent visual magnitude of +4.00, which is bright enough to be seen with the naked eye. Based upon parallax measurements made with the Hipparcos spacecraft, it is located at a distance of 125 light years from the Sun. As of 2010, the two components of this system had an angular separation of 0.0318″ along a position angle of 286.9°. The magnitude difference between the two components is 0.1. It is considered a member of the Sirius supercluster. The primary component is an Am star with a stellar classification of kA3hA5mA5 V. This notation indicates the star has the weak calcium II K-line of an A3 star, and the hydrogen and metallic lines of an A5 star. It has an estimated age of 427 million years. In 1992, it was found to be emitting an infrared excess, suggesting the presence of a circumstellar disk A Circumstellar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gamma Volantis
Gamma Volantis, Latinized from γ Volantis, is a wide binary star system in the southern constellation of Volans. Based upon parallax measurements, it is approximately 133 light years from Earth. It is bright enough to be seen with the naked eye and can be found around 9° to the east-southeast of the Large Magellanic Cloud. The brighter component, designated γ2 Volantis, is an orange K-type giant star with a stellar classification of K0 III and an apparent magnitude of +3.62, making this the brightest star in the constellation. Its companion, γ1 Volantis, is an F-type main-sequence star of classification F2 V and an apparent magnitude of +5.70. As of 2002, the pair were at an angular separation of 14.1 along a position angle In astronomy, position angle (usually abbreviated PA) is the convention for measuring angles on the sky. The International Astronomical Union defines it as the angle measured relative to the Celestial pole, north celestial pole (NCP ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beta Volantis
Beta Volantis, Latinized from β Volantis, is the second-brightest star of the southern constellation of Volans, after Gamma2 Volantis. It has an apparent visual magnitude of 3.75, which is sufficiently bright to allow it to be viewed with the naked eye. Based upon an annual parallax shift of 30.33 mas as seen from Earth, its distance can be estimated as 107.5 light years from the Sun. The star is moving away from the Sun with a radial velocity of +27 km/s. This is a single, orange-hued star with a stellar classification of K2 III, indicating it is an evolved K-type giant star. It is a red clump star, which means it is on the horizontal branch and is generating energy through helium fusion at its core. The stellar mass has been estimated via astroseismology, giving a value of 1.6 times the mass of the Sun. It is radiating about 41 times the Sun's luminosity from its enlarged photosphere at an effective temperature The effective temperature of a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kappa Volantis
Kappa Volantis, Latinized from κ Volantis, is a quadruple star system in the southern constellation of Volans. The primary component has an apparent visual magnitude of 5.37, while the secondary companion is magnitude 5.65; individually, both a bright enough to be faintly visible to the naked eye. Based upon parallax measurements, the stars appear to be around 420−430 light-years from the Sun. Properties The brightest component, κ1 Volantis, is a blue-white B-type star with a stellar classification showing characteristics of a both a subgiant and giant star. It has an unseen companion, and the pair form a single-lined spectroscopic binary. The star has nearly three times the Sun's mass, and 3.8 times its radius. It radiates at 129 times the Sun's luminosity from its photosphere at an effective temperature of . Companion Separated from κ1 Volantis by 65 arcseconds A minute of arc, arcminute (abbreviated as arcmin), arc minute, or minute arc, denot ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
