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A dedicated star
Adhil
warm orange · Andromeda · ξ And
Dedicated to
Maya
by Her sister, June · August 12, 2026
“You were born on the brightest night of my life. Whenever you feel small, remember: there is a star that has carried your name since before you could read it, and it is still up there, still burning, still yours.”
This dedication
- Dedicated to
- Maya
- Dedicated by
- Her sister, June
- Recorded
- August 12, 2026
- Held until
- August 12, 2027
When this dedication ends, Adhil becomes available again. Want it? Put the date in your calendar.
Adhil at a glance
- Constellation
- Andromeda
- Other name
- ξ And
- Catalogue number
- HIP 6411
- Distance
- ≈ 214 light-years
- Brightness
- Magnitude 4.87 naked-eye
- Star type
- K0III-IV
- Colour
- warm orange
- Best seen from
- The Northern Hemisphere and lower southern latitudes
- Right ascension
- 01h 22m 20s
- Declination
- +45° 31′ 44″
J2000 catalogue coordinates that can be independently cross-checked against astronomical databases. A planetarium app showing coordinates of date will differ slightly, because proper motion and precession move a star’s apparent position over time.
What kind of star is Adhil?
Adhil is an orange giant. Its surface runs roughly 4,000 to 5,000°C, cool enough that the light carries a visible orange. Colour in a star is a temperature reading rather than a decoration: the hot ones are blue and the cool ones red, the opposite way round to a kitchen tap.
Its colour is not the whole story. An orange star still in the steady part of its life would burn for tens of thousands of millions of years. This one is past that stage, and it is cool at the surface because it has swollen outward, not because it was born this way.
It is a giant, which is what a star becomes when it exhausts the hydrogen in its core. It has swollen outward and cooled at the surface, and it is now brighter than it ever was as a young star. The Sun will do this too, in about five thousand million years.
Adhil drifts about 3.3 arcseconds a century against the stars behind it. Slow by any human measure, and still enough that the sky your distant descendants see will not be the one in your photographs.
The light you are looking at is old
The light arriving from Adhil tonight left in about 1812, some 214 years ago. Everything that has happened since, every person you have heard of from the last few centuries, happened while it was in transit.
That delay is the part people find hardest and like most. A star is the one thing you can give someone that was already old before either of you was born and will outlast anything else you could have chosen.
It is comfortably visible without equipment on a decent night.
What does the name Adhil mean?
Adhil is a lingua franca term from an Arabic phrase al-dhayl meaning 'the train'.
Name origin from English Wikipedia. AsterNym does not invent an etymology where none is recorded, and most stars in this catalogue have none: they carry modern names, or a catalogue designation and nothing older.
Where can you see Adhil?
It is easy to see from most of the Northern Hemisphere. It can also appear from lower southern latitudes, but it never rises for observers south of about latitude 44°S. It passes directly overhead at latitude 46°N. It stands highest at midnight in October, so October and November evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 4.87 it is a naked-eye star only under a dark sky, binoculars make it certain.
Adhil belongs to Andromeda.
What does Adhil mean in astrology?
The classical fixed-star tradition: Ptolemy, the medieval Behenian lists, Robson’s 1923 compilation. Is silent on Adhil, and we don’t invent lore where none exists. What astrology can still read is the star’s real position, below.
Projected onto the zodiac the way fixed-star astrology reads any star, Adhil stands at 7° Taurus at the J2000 epoch, and the Sun passes that degree around 27 April in the years around 2000. Fixed-star longitude shifts slowly against the tropical zodiac because of precession, about one degree every seventy-two years, so a natal conjunction must be calculated for the birth year rather than read off this J2000 value or a calendar date.
Traditional interpretations, not facts or predictions. The position and dates are computed.
Frequently asked questions about Adhil
- What does Adhil mean in astrology?
- The classical fixed-star tradition has no documented meaning for Adhil. Projected onto the zodiac, Adhil stands at 7° Taurus, and the Sun passes that degree each year around 27 April.
- Is Adhil the brightest star?
- Adhil shines at magnitude 4.87 · visible to the naked eye on a clear night, one of the few thousand stars with an officially recognised name.
- How far away is Adhil?
- Adhil is approximately 214 light-years from Earth. The light reaching us tonight began its journey around 214 years ago.
- Which constellation contains Adhil?
- Adhil is part of Andromeda.
- Can everyone see Adhil?
- It is easy to see from most of the Northern Hemisphere. It can also appear from lower southern latitudes, but it never rises for observers south of about latitude 44°S. It passes directly overhead at latitude 46°N. It stands highest at midnight in October, so October and November evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 4.87 it is a naked-eye star only under a dark sky, binoculars make it certain.
- Is dedicating Adhil an official astronomical renaming?
- No. Adhil keeps its internationally recognised astronomical name. An AsterNym dedication records your personal name and message in the AsterNym registry without changing the star's scientific identity.
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