The AsterNym star registry
Menkar
Menkar: the deep red star of Cetus
deep red · Cetus · α Cet
Menkar is a deep red star in the constellation Cetus, one of the stars with a proper name recognised in the IAU Catalog of Star Names. At magnitude 2.54 it is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky.
Most stars in the sky are anonymous points of light. Menkar 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
Menkar at a glance
- Constellation
- Cetus
- Other name
- α Cet
- Catalogue number
- HIP 14135
- Distance
- ≈ 220 light-years
- Brightness
- Magnitude 2.54 naked-eye
- Star type
- M1.5 III
- Colour
- deep red
- Best seen from
- Almost everywhere on Earth
- Right ascension
- 03h 02m 16s
- Declination
- +04° 05′ 24″
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 Menkar?
Menkar is a red giant. Its surface runs under 4,000°C, which is cool as stars go and why the colour is unmistakably red. 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. A red star still in the steady part of its life would burn for longer than the universe has yet existed. 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.
The light you are looking at is old
The light arriving from Menkar tonight left in about 1806, some 220 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 Menkar mean?
It has the traditional name Menkar, deriving from the Arabic word منخر manħar "nostril" (of Cetus).
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 Menkar dedication represent?
Menkar 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 Cetus in the sky.”
Where can you see Menkar?
It sits 4° north of the celestial equator, so it clears the horizon everywhere short of latitude 86°S, in practice, every inhabited latitude on Earth. It passes directly overhead at latitude 4°N. It stands highest at midnight in November, so November and December evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 2.54 it is an easy naked-eye star from any reasonably dark spot.
Menkar belongs to Cetus.
What does Menkar mean in astrology?
The classical fixed-star tradition: Ptolemy, the medieval Behenian lists, Robson’s 1923 compilation. Is silent on Menkar, 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, Menkar stands at 14° Taurus at the J2000 epoch, and the Sun passes that degree around 4 May 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 Menkar 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 Menkar →Real star · your message · a page to share
Your Menkar dedication includes
- Your chosen dedication name
- Your personal message
- Menkar's real astronomical coordinates
- A shareable dedication page
- Its location on the AsterNym Galaxy Map
- An optional printable certificate and gift presentation
Menkar keeps its established astronomical name. Your dedication is a personal commemorative record within the AsterNym registry.
Frequently asked questions about Menkar
- What does Menkar mean in astrology?
- The classical fixed-star tradition has no documented meaning for Menkar. Projected onto the zodiac, Menkar stands at 14° Taurus, and the Sun passes that degree each year around 4 May.
- Is Menkar the brightest star?
- Menkar shines at magnitude 2.54 · visible to the naked eye on a clear night, one of the few thousand stars with an officially recognised name.
- How far away is Menkar?
- Menkar is approximately 220 light-years from Earth. The light reaching us tonight began its journey around 220 years ago.
- Which constellation contains Menkar?
- Menkar is part of Cetus.
- Can everyone see Menkar?
- It sits 4° north of the celestial equator, so it clears the horizon everywhere short of latitude 86°S, in practice, every inhabited latitude on Earth. It passes directly overhead at latitude 4°N. It stands highest at midnight in November, so November and December evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 2.54 it is an easy naked-eye star from any reasonably dark spot.
- Is dedicating Menkar an official astronomical renaming?
- No. Menkar 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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