The AsterNym star registry
Yildun
Yildun: the white star of Ursa Minor
white · Ursa Minor · δ UMi
Yildun is a white star, burning hotter than our own Sun in the constellation Ursa Minor, one of the stars with a proper name recognised in the IAU Catalog of Star Names. At magnitude 4.35 it is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky.
Most stars in the sky are anonymous points of light. Yildun 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
Yildun at a glance
- Constellation
- Ursa Minor
- Other name
- δ UMi
- Catalogue number
- HIP 85822
- Distance
- ≈ 172 light-years
- Brightness
- Magnitude 4.35 naked-eye
- Star type
- A1 V
- Colour
- white
- Best seen from
- The far northern sky
- Right ascension
- 17h 32m 12s
- Declination
- +86° 35′ 11″
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 Yildun?
Yildun 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.
The light you are looking at is old
The light arriving from Yildun tonight left in about 1854, some 172 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 could a Yildun dedication represent?
Yildun 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 Ursa Minor in the sky.”
Where can you see Yildun?
It is a deep-northern star: easy from Europe, North America and northern Asia, but it never rises for observers south of about latitude 3°S. It passes directly overhead at latitude 87°N. It stands highest at midnight in June, so June and July evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 4.35 it is a naked-eye star only under a dark sky, binoculars make it certain.
Yildun belongs to Ursa Minor.
What does Yildun mean in astrology?
The classical fixed-star tradition: Ptolemy, the medieval Behenian lists, Robson’s 1923 compilation. Is silent on Yildun, 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, Yildun stands at 1° Cancer at the J2000 epoch, and the Sun passes that degree around 21 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 Yildun 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 Yildun →Real star · your message · a page to share
Your Yildun dedication includes
- Your chosen dedication name
- Your personal message
- Yildun's real astronomical coordinates
- A shareable dedication page
- Its location on the AsterNym Galaxy Map
- An optional printable certificate and gift presentation
Yildun keeps its established astronomical name. Your dedication is a personal commemorative record within the AsterNym registry.
Frequently asked questions about Yildun
- What does Yildun mean in astrology?
- The classical fixed-star tradition has no documented meaning for Yildun. Projected onto the zodiac, Yildun stands at 1° Cancer, and the Sun passes that degree each year around 21 June.
- Is Yildun the brightest star?
- Yildun shines at magnitude 4.35 · visible to the naked eye on a clear night, one of the few thousand stars with an officially recognised name.
- How far away is Yildun?
- Yildun is approximately 172 light-years from Earth. The light reaching us tonight began its journey around 172 years ago.
- Which constellation contains Yildun?
- Yildun is part of Ursa Minor.
- Can everyone see Yildun?
- It is a deep-northern star: easy from Europe, North America and northern Asia, but it never rises for observers south of about latitude 3°S. It passes directly overhead at latitude 87°N. It stands highest at midnight in June, so June and July evenings are the best time to look. At magnitude 4.35 it is a naked-eye star only under a dark sky, binoculars make it certain.
- Is dedicating Yildun an official astronomical renaming?
- No. Yildun 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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