The Constellation Centaurus, the Centaur
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Centaurus - The Centaur
Below the stars of
Hydra, the sea serpent,
and
Scorpius,
the acorpion, you can find the half-man, half-horse creature,
Centaurus. He faces east holding a lance-like pole which he is using
to kill Lupus, the wolf standing in front of him.
Centaurus' brightest star (Alpha Centauri), is called
Toliman or Rigel Kentaurus. It's the third brightest star in the sky
and the closest star to the Sun. Alpha Centauri is really a triple
star: two components form a double star. The third component is a red
dwarf, more than 2 degrees away from the bright pair. It is called
Proxima Centauri (closest in Centaurus) because, of the three
components, it is the closest to Earth, only a little more than 4 light-years
away.
Centaurus is home to Omega Centauri (NGC 5139), the brightest and
largest globular cluster
in the sky. It is visible to the naked eye as a hazy spot of 4 minutes
of arc. It is one of the closest globular clusters, at only 17,000
light-years away.
According to Greek mythology, it was Centaurus who first fashioned the
constellations and taught humans how to read the sky. He placed a
picture of himself in the sky to guide the Argonauts on their search
for the Golden Fleece.
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