Andrew Cooper
Oct 19, 2023    Waikoloa, HI (map)
20cm f/6 Newtonian, Cave Astrola @ 76x
Seeing: 6 Transparency: 7 Moon: 0%

Brilliant rich orange, no companion noted

Captain William Henry Smyth
Nov 21, 1836    No. 6 The Crescent, Bedford, England (map)
150mm f/17.6 refractor by Tully 1827

A Greenwich star, with a distant companion, preceding the bunch of τ's with which Bayer's map is disfigured; to be readily identified by shooting a ray from Procyon through the cluster in Orion's sword, and extending it nearly as far again to the eastward, or by a like process with Capella and the Hyades. A 2½, yellow; B 10, pale grey. It is in the south part of the upper reach of the River; and there is a third star, of the llth magnitude, in the sp quadrant. The leader has a distinct movement through space, to which the following values are assigned:

    P....  RA +0".16  Dec. -0".ll
    B....     +0".09       -0".10
   [Hipparcos +0".06157    -0".11311]

γ1 Eridani is called Zaurak, from the Neyyir-al-Zaurak, or bright star of the boat, of the Arabians: and being at the flexure of the River, as well as large and bright, seems to be the one alluded to by Hipparchus, Patav. Uranolog., as that which the equinoctial colure passed through in the time of Eudoxus. The same colure, however, could not have cotemporaneously passed through the right hand of Perseus.

― A Cycle of Celestial Objects Vol II, The Bedford Catalogue, William Henry Smyth, 1844

Drawings, descriptions, and CCD photos are copyright Andrew Cooper unless otherwise noted, no usage without permission.

A complete list of credits and sources can be found on the about page