Astronomy: The Science of the Heavenly BodiesTodd, David P. (David Peck)
History
Astronomy: The Science of the Heavenly Bodies
Todd, David P. (David Peck)
Astronomy
In the ancient historical records are found accounts of several such
stars. For instance, in the Chinese annals there is an allusion to such
a stellar outburst in the constellation of Scorpio, B. C. 134. This was
observed also by Hipparchus and, no doubt, it was the immediate
incentive which led to his construction of the first known catalogue of
stars, so that similar happenings might be detected in the future. In
November, 1572, Tycho Brahe observed the most famous of all new stars,
which blazed out in the constellation Cassiopeia. In something over a
year it had completely disappeared.
In 1604-1605 a new star of equal brightness was seen in Ophiuchus by
Kepler; it also faded out to invisibility in 1606. Kepler and Tycho
printed very complete records of these remarkable objects. The
eighteenth century passed without any new stars being seen or recorded.
There was one of the fifth magnitude in 1848, and another of the
seventh magnitude in 1860; and in May, 1866, a star of the second
magnitude suddenly made its appearance in Corona Borealis; and one of
the third magnitude in Cygnus in November, 1876. The latter was fully
observed by Schmidt of Athens and became a faint telescopic star within
a few weeks. It is now of the fifteenth magnitude.
In 1885 astronomers were surprised to find suddenly a new star of the
sixth magnitude very close to the brightest part of the great nebula in
Andromeda; it ran its course in about six months, fading with many
fluctuations in brightness, and no star is now visible in its position
even with the telescope. Stars of this class are known to astronomers as
Novæ, usually with the genitive of the constellation name, as Nova
Andromedæ.
In 1891-1892 Nova Aurigæ made its spectacular appearance and yielded a
distinctly double and complex spectrum for more than a month. Many pairs
of lines indicated a community of origin as to substance, and accurate
measurement showed a large displacement with a relative velocity of more
than 500 miles per second. For each bright hydrogen line displaced
toward the red there was a dark companion line or band about equally
displaced toward the violet much as if the weird light of Nova Aurigæ
originated in a solid globe moving swiftly away from us and plunging
into an irregular nebulous mass as swiftly approaching us. Parallax
observations of Nova Aurigæ made it immensely remote, perhaps within the
Galaxy, and it still exists as a faint nebulous star.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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