The AsterNym star registry
Red Rectangle
Red Rectangle: the blue-white star of Monoceros
blue-white · Monoceros · HD 44179
Red Rectangle is a blue-white star, the colour of the hottest, youngest suns in the constellation Monoceros, one of the stars with a proper name recognised in the IAU Catalog of Star Names. At magnitude 9.33 it is a binocular or telescope object.
Most stars in the sky are anonymous points of light. Red Rectangle 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
Red Rectangle at a glance
- Constellation
- Monoceros
- Other name
- HD 44179
- Catalogue number
- HIP 30089
- Distance
- ≈ 1,437 light-years
- Brightness
- Magnitude 9.33 telescope
- Star type
- B8
- Colour
- blue-white
- Best seen from
- Almost everywhere on Earth
- Right ascension
- 06h 19m 58s
- Declination
- −10° 38′ 15″
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 Red Rectangle?
Red Rectangle is a blue-white star. Its surface runs somewhere between 10,000 and 30,000°C, which is what gives it a blue-white cast. 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.
It is spending its fuel at a rate the Sun never will. Most of the bright stars in familiar constellations are this kind, which is why the night sky looks younger and hotter than the average star actually is.
A star of this class gets tens of millions of years, against the Sun's ten thousand million.
Red Rectangle barely moves against the background sky, which is mostly a statement about how far away it is. For every practical purpose, including yours, it is fixed.
The light you are looking at is old
Red Rectangle is about 1,437 light years away, so the light reaching you now set out around 589. You are not looking at the star as it is. You are looking at the star as it was, and there is no way to see it any other way.
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 sits at the edge of what an unaided eye can do, so finding it is a deliberate act rather than an accident.
What could a Red Rectangle dedication represent?
Red Rectangle 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 Monoceros in the sky.”
Where can you see Red Rectangle?
It sits 11° south of the celestial equator, so it clears the horizon everywhere short of latitude 79°N, in practice, every inhabited latitude on Earth. It passes directly overhead at latitude 11°S. It stands highest at midnight in December, so December and January evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 9.33 it sits below naked-eye reach; binoculars or a small telescope will find it.
Red Rectangle belongs to Monoceros.
What does Red Rectangle mean in astrology?
The classical fixed-star tradition: Ptolemy, the medieval Behenian lists, Robson’s 1923 compilation. Is silent on Red Rectangle, 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, Red Rectangle stands at 5° Cancer at the J2000 epoch, and the Sun passes that degree around 25 June 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 Red Rectangle 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 Red Rectangle →Real star · your message · a page to share
Your Red Rectangle dedication includes
- Your chosen dedication name
- Your personal message
- Red Rectangle's real astronomical coordinates
- A shareable dedication page
- Its location on the AsterNym Galaxy Map
- An optional printable certificate and gift presentation
Red Rectangle keeps its established astronomical name. Your dedication is a personal commemorative record within the AsterNym registry.
Frequently asked questions about Red Rectangle
- What does Red Rectangle mean in astrology?
- The classical fixed-star tradition has no documented meaning for Red Rectangle. Projected onto the zodiac, Red Rectangle stands at 5° Cancer, and the Sun passes that degree each year around 25 June.
- Is Red Rectangle the brightest star?
- Red Rectangle shines at magnitude 9.33 · a binocular-and-telescope star, one of the few thousand stars with an officially recognised name.
- How far away is Red Rectangle?
- Red Rectangle is approximately 1,437 light-years from Earth. The light reaching us tonight began its journey around 1,437 years ago.
- Which constellation contains Red Rectangle?
- Red Rectangle is part of Monoceros.
- Can everyone see Red Rectangle?
- It sits 11° south of the celestial equator, so it clears the horizon everywhere short of latitude 79°N, in practice, every inhabited latitude on Earth. It passes directly overhead at latitude 11°S. It stands highest at midnight in December, so December and January evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 9.33 it sits below naked-eye reach; binoculars or a small telescope will find it.
- Is dedicating Red Rectangle an official astronomical renaming?
- No. Red Rectangle 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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