Talk:Draco (constellation)

Drac

Drac{Dragon}

In a somewhat Roman/Greek legend, the dragon pictured in the constellation of Draco was said to guard the polar star.

Very anciently, the stars of Ursa Minor were considered to represent the Dragon's wing.

These sentences had no references cited to verify them, so I've removed them for the time being. Aside from their vague provenance, though, these are very interesting facts, provided a source can prove their factuality.

Could someone explain this sentence? "By astronomical chance, the Dragon's Head and Dragon's Tail mark the positions of the lunar nodes, those points where the paths of the solar and lunar orbits intersect and where solar and lunar eclipses may occur. This doesn't seem like it can be correct, because the lunar orbit plane precessess with an 18 year period. By astronomical chance, the Dragon's Head and Dragon's Tail mark the positions of the those points where the paths of the solar and lunar orbits intersect and where solar and lunar eclipses may occur. The Dragon's head (Caput draconis, refers to the ascending node, the Dragon's tail , the descending node. In several cultures, an eclipse was attributed to the disappearance of the moon or sun as they were swallowed by a dragon.

            By:Annie Lang

Thuban / Lumbis

The star α Driaconis is generally known as Thuban, from what I've been able to gather, and is referred to as such throughout the article. However, the first mention of it on the page calls it "lumbis" instead; I did a rather quick search for the name/word, and didn't come up with much. It's got something to do with stars, but I don't think it's a name...

...the link to Thuban was changed to Lumbis a mere few weeks ago, by an anon IP account with only one contribution, so I have no way to tell if the edit was meant to fix or confuse. (it's doing a good job of the latter for me.) Can someone with more experience in the matter then me tell if this was simply a mistaken edit, or actually a productive one? I have no experience with stars or constellations before this point, so I don't trust any judgment calls I make on the subject... -- Jïörüjï Ðērākō.>.cнаt^ 05:31, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Well hey Jioruji. I'm clueless when it comes to extraterrestrial things, but I'd say that it's best to have consistency throughout the article. Calor (talk) 05:34, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Consistency is something I had forgotten about. :D Yes, by that logic, that link should have never been changed, and I'll revert it. But I'm quite curious about the Thuban / Lumbis connection still; if the star is or was known as Lumbis at one point, that's something worth documenting. If it wasn't and isn't, then I personally wouldn't mind having things cleared up.

And... Calor? Expletive deleted. I think I know that name. Please tell me it's just a popular username or something, and not that I'm being stalked across the 'net. -- Jïörüjï Ðērākō.>.cнаt^ 06:04, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Nobody's stalking you, it's the same as GW, GWW, and GW2W. The sig was a blaring sign when I saw it. A small world, ain't it? And I don't know about any Lumbis/Thuban name changing stuff. Calor (t) 02:23, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

RA/Dec

The RA/Dec we have listed, 15h / +75 degrees, is the same as what we have listed for Ursa Minor. In fact, that point appears to be inside Ursa Minor. What's the algorithm for determining these coordinates? DenisMoskowitz (talk) 23:01, 12 February 2008 (UTC).

File:Draco nebula.gif Nominated for Deletion

	An image used in this article, File:Draco nebula.gif, has been nominated for deletion at Wikimedia Commons in the following category: Deletion requests July 2011 What should I do?
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Taweret removal

I removed the paragraph of the mythology section that begins with a description of Draco as originally the constellation of the Egyptian goddess Taweret. I did this for two reasons: 1.) Although the ancient Greeks drew at least occasionally upon Egyptian culture and myth for their own stories, there is nothing-- NOTHING-- about Taweret to tie her as a collection of stars to the same string of stars as the ancient Greek "Draco." In fact, if anything, Taweret might have been associated with the Big Dipper. But not Draco. 2.) I found the reference which was used to make the original inference that Taweret was connected to Draco. It is a "Starry, Starry Night Discovery Book" published in the UK for children ages 9-12, and it contains no citations-- in other words, it appears that the connection of Taweret to Draco was likely entirely a fabrication from a children's guide to astronomy, a guide without any proof of its sources, and therefore an inappropriate piece of info to be playing across Wikipedia.

Wow. That was a long way of saying, "I took it out 'cause it was wrong." But there you have it. KDS4444^Talk 07:51, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

File:Sidney Hall - Urania's Mirror - Draco and Ursa Minor.jpg to appear as POTD soon

Hello! This is a note to let the editors of this article know that File:Sidney Hall - Urania's Mirror - Draco and Ursa Minor.jpg will be appearing as picture of the day on June 21, 2016. You can view and edit the POTD blurb at Template:POTD/2016-06-21. If this article needs any attention or maintenance, it would be preferable if that could be done before its appearance on the Main Page. — Chris Woodrich (talk) 03:13, 5 June 2016 (UTC)

Picture of the day

Draco is a constellation in the far northern sky. Its name is Latin for dragon. It was one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd century astronomer Ptolemy and remains one of the 88 modern constellations today. Draco is circumpolar and can thus be seen all year from northern latitudes.

This illustration comes from Urania's Mirror, a set of 32 astronomical star chart cards first published in November 1824. Shown beneath Draco is Ursa Minor.Lithograph: Sidney Hall; restoration: Adam Cuerden

Vandalism removal

quick and easy — Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.118.72.187 (talk) 02:48, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

Disambiguation

This page isn't linked from the disambiguation page for "Draco" - can somebody more wiki-savvy please remedy that? Apologies for my shortcoming! 86.161.5.205 (talk) 19:01, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Draco

Was this used by jk Rawling in the Harry Potter books? 50.104.182.86 (talk) 15:30, 29 July 2024 (UTC)