The AsterNym star registry
Porrima
Porrima: the yellow-white star of Virgo
yellow-white · Virgo · γ Vir
Porrima is a yellow-white star, a near cousin of our own Sun's colour in the constellation Virgo, one of the stars with a proper name recognised in the IAU Catalog of Star Names. At magnitude 3.44 it is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky.
Most stars in the sky are anonymous points of light. Porrima 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
Porrima at a glance
- Constellation
- Virgo
- Other name
- γ Vir
- Catalogue number
- HIP 61941
- Distance
- ≈ 38 light-years
- Brightness
- Magnitude 3.44 naked-eye
- Star type
- F0V+...
- Colour
- yellow-white
- Best seen from
- Almost everywhere on Earth
- Right ascension
- 12h 41m 40s
- Declination
- −01° 26′ 58″
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 Porrima?
Porrima is a yellow-white main-sequence star. Its surface runs about 6,000 to 7,500°C, a shade hotter than the Sun. 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.
A little brighter and a little shorter-lived than the Sun, and near the edge of the range where a planet could plausibly hold liquid water for long enough to matter.
A star of this class gets two to four thousand million years.
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.
Porrima moves noticeably against the background sky, about 62 arcseconds a century. The constellation it belongs to will not have quite this shape in ten thousand years.
The light you are looking at is old
The light you can see from Porrima left in 1988, 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 comfortably visible without equipment on a decent night.
What could a Porrima dedication represent?
Porrima 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 Virgo in the sky.”
Where can you see Porrima?
It sits 1° south of the celestial equator, so it clears the horizon everywhere short of latitude 89°N, in practice, every inhabited latitude on Earth. It passes directly overhead at latitude 1°S. It stands highest at midnight in April, so April and May evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 3.44 it is a naked-eye star only under a dark sky, binoculars make it certain.
Porrima belongs to Virgo.
What does Porrima mean in astrology?
The classical fixed-star tradition: Ptolemy, the medieval Behenian lists, Robson’s 1923 compilation. Is silent on Porrima, 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, Porrima stands at 10° Libra at the J2000 epoch, and the Sun passes that degree around 29 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 Porrima 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 Porrima →Real star · your message · a page to share
Your Porrima dedication includes
- Your chosen dedication name
- Your personal message
- Porrima's real astronomical coordinates
- A shareable dedication page
- Its location on the AsterNym Galaxy Map
- An optional printable certificate and gift presentation
Porrima keeps its established astronomical name. Your dedication is a personal commemorative record within the AsterNym registry.
Frequently asked questions about Porrima
- What does Porrima mean in astrology?
- The classical fixed-star tradition has no documented meaning for Porrima. Projected onto the zodiac, Porrima stands at 10° Libra, and the Sun passes that degree each year around 29 September.
- Is Porrima the brightest star?
- Porrima shines at magnitude 3.44 · visible to the naked eye on a clear night, one of the few thousand stars with an officially recognised name.
- How far away is Porrima?
- Porrima is approximately 38 light-years from Earth. The light reaching us tonight began its journey around 38 years ago.
- Which constellation contains Porrima?
- Porrima is part of Virgo.
- Can everyone see Porrima?
- It sits 1° south of the celestial equator, so it clears the horizon everywhere short of latitude 89°N, in practice, every inhabited latitude on Earth. It passes directly overhead at latitude 1°S. It stands highest at midnight in April, so April and May evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 3.44 it is a naked-eye star only under a dark sky, binoculars make it certain.
- Is dedicating Porrima an official astronomical renaming?
- No. Porrima 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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