The AsterNym star registry
Alsephina
Alsephina: the white star of Vela
white · Vela · δ Vel
Alsephina is a white star, burning hotter than our own Sun in the constellation Vela, one of the stars with a proper name recognised in the IAU Catalog of Star Names. At magnitude 1.96 it is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky.
Most stars in the sky are anonymous points of light. Alsephina is not. Some IAU-recognised names are ancient; others were adopted by the IAU only recently. Either way, the star already has a scientific identity, and a dedication attaches a human story to it.
Real star · Personal dedication · Recorded in the AsterNym registry
See what a dedicated page looks like: preview
Alsephina at a glance
- Constellation
- Vela
- Other name
- δ Vel
- Catalogue number
- HIP 42913
- Distance
- ≈ 80 light-years
- Brightness
- Magnitude 1.96 naked-eye
- Star type
- A1 V
- Colour
- white
- Best seen from
- The Southern Hemisphere and lower northern latitudes
- Right ascension
- 08h 44m 43s
- Declination
- −54° 42′ 31″
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 Alsephina?
Alsephina is a white main-sequence star. Its surface runs around 7,500 to 10,000°C, hot enough to look white or blue-white to the eye. 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.
These are the classic bright white stars. Sirius and Vega are both this kind, and they are the reason people describe stars as white when most of the galaxy's stars are actually red and too faint to see.
A star of this class gets roughly a thousand million years, a tenth of what the Sun gets.
It is a main-sequence star, which despite the word dwarf simply means it is in the long stable middle of its life, fusing hydrogen in its core exactly as the Sun is doing now.
Alsephina drifts about 10.8 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 you can see from Alsephina left in 1946, which puts it roughly a lifetime ago. Nobody has invented anything since then that the light knows about; it has simply been travelling.
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 also one of the brighter stars in the sky, which is why it carries a proper name at all rather than a catalogue number.
What does the name Alsephina mean?
Delta Velorum bore the traditional name Alsafinah, which stems from the Arabic name al-safīnah meaning "the ship", referring to the ancient Greek constellation Argo Navis, the ship of the Argonauts.
It was first used in a 10th-century Arabic translation of the Almagest, written by the Greek astronomer Ptolemy in the second century AD.
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.
What could a Alsephina dedication represent?
Alsephina is especially meaningful for someone who:
- · Deserves something older than any gift shop
- · Marks a beginning, an anniversary or a promise
- · Is remembered every time you look up
- · Has a light you want recorded somewhere permanent
Dedication idea
“For the one I think of when I find Vela in the sky.”
Where can you see Alsephina?
It is easy to see from much of the Southern Hemisphere. It can also appear from lower northern latitudes, but it never rises for observers north of about latitude 35°N. It passes directly overhead at latitude 55°S. It stands highest at midnight in February, so February and March evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 1.96 it is an easy naked-eye star from any reasonably dark spot.
Alsephina belongs to Vela.
What does Alsephina mean in astrology?
The classical fixed-star tradition: Ptolemy, the medieval Behenian lists, Robson’s 1923 compilation. Is silent on Alsephina, 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, Alsephina stands at 18° Virgo at the J2000 epoch, and the Sun passes that degree around 7 September 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.
Dedicate Alsephina to someone who matters
A flower fades. A card is eventually put away. A star gives your message a place in the sky.
from$29.95a year
Dedicate Alsephina →Real star · your message · a page to share
Your Alsephina dedication includes
- Your chosen dedication name
- Your personal message
- Alsephina's real astronomical coordinates
- A shareable dedication page
- Its location on the AsterNym Galaxy Map
- An optional printable certificate and gift presentation
Alsephina keeps its established astronomical name. Your dedication is a personal commemorative record within the AsterNym registry.
Frequently asked questions about Alsephina
- What does Alsephina mean in astrology?
- The classical fixed-star tradition has no documented meaning for Alsephina. Projected onto the zodiac, Alsephina stands at 18° Virgo, and the Sun passes that degree each year around 7 September.
- Is Alsephina the brightest star?
- Alsephina shines at magnitude 1.96 · visible to the naked eye on a clear night, one of the few thousand stars with an officially recognised name.
- How far away is Alsephina?
- Alsephina is approximately 80 light-years from Earth. The light reaching us tonight began its journey around 80 years ago.
- Which constellation contains Alsephina?
- Alsephina is part of Vela.
- Can everyone see Alsephina?
- It is easy to see from much of the Southern Hemisphere. It can also appear from lower northern latitudes, but it never rises for observers north of about latitude 35°N. It passes directly overhead at latitude 55°S. It stands highest at midnight in February, so February and March evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 1.96 it is an easy naked-eye star from any reasonably dark spot.
- Is dedicating Alsephina an official astronomical renaming?
- No. Alsephina 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.
Explore nearby stars
