The AsterNym star registry
Tegmine
Tegmine: the golden star of Cancer
golden · Cancer · ζ1 Cnc
Tegmine is a golden star, warmer-toned than our Sun in the constellation Cancer, one of the stars with a proper name recognised in the IAU Catalog of Star Names. At magnitude 5.24 it is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky.
Most stars in the sky are anonymous points of light. Tegmine 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
Tegmine at a glance
- Constellation
- Cancer
- Other name
- ζ1 Cnc
- Catalogue number
- HIP 40167
- Distance
- ≈ 82 light-years
- Brightness
- Magnitude 5.24 naked-eye
- Star type
- G0V
- Colour
- golden
- Best seen from
- Almost everywhere on Earth
- Right ascension
- 08h 12m 13s
- Declination
- +17° 38′ 52″
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 Tegmine?
Tegmine is a yellow main-sequence star. Its surface runs about 5,500°C, near enough the Sun's own surface temperature. 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.
This is the Sun's class. Looking at a star like this is the closest you get to seeing what our own star looks like from outside, which is a stranger thought than it first sounds.
A star of this class gets around ten thousand million years, and the Sun is halfway through its own.
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.
Tegmine drifts about 15.4 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 Tegmine left in 1944, 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 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 Tegmine dedication represent?
Tegmine 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 Cancer in the sky.”
Where can you see Tegmine?
It sits 18° north of the celestial equator, so it clears the horizon everywhere short of latitude 72°S, in practice, every inhabited latitude on Earth. It passes directly overhead at latitude 18°N. It stands highest at midnight in January, so January and February evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 5.24 it is a naked-eye star only under a dark sky, binoculars make it certain.
Tegmine belongs to Cancer.
What does Tegmine mean in astrology?
The classical fixed-star tradition: Ptolemy, the medieval Behenian lists, Robson’s 1923 compilation. Is silent on Tegmine, 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, Tegmine stands at 1° Leo at the J2000 epoch, and the Sun passes that degree around 21 July 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 Tegmine 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 Tegmine →Real star · your message · a page to share
Your Tegmine dedication includes
- Your chosen dedication name
- Your personal message
- Tegmine's real astronomical coordinates
- A shareable dedication page
- Its location on the AsterNym Galaxy Map
- An optional printable certificate and gift presentation
Tegmine keeps its established astronomical name. Your dedication is a personal commemorative record within the AsterNym registry.
Frequently asked questions about Tegmine
- What does Tegmine mean in astrology?
- The classical fixed-star tradition has no documented meaning for Tegmine. Projected onto the zodiac, Tegmine stands at 1° Leo, and the Sun passes that degree each year around 21 July.
- Is Tegmine the brightest star?
- Tegmine shines at magnitude 5.24 · visible to the naked eye on a clear night, one of the few thousand stars with an officially recognised name.
- How far away is Tegmine?
- Tegmine is approximately 82 light-years from Earth. The light reaching us tonight began its journey around 82 years ago.
- Which constellation contains Tegmine?
- Tegmine is part of Cancer.
- Can everyone see Tegmine?
- It sits 18° north of the celestial equator, so it clears the horizon everywhere short of latitude 72°S, in practice, every inhabited latitude on Earth. It passes directly overhead at latitude 18°N. It stands highest at midnight in January, so January and February evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 5.24 it is a naked-eye star only under a dark sky, binoculars make it certain.
- Is dedicating Tegmine an official astronomical renaming?
- No. Tegmine 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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