Navigating the Night Sky How to Identify the Stars and Constellations [Paperback]

This book will interest anyone who marvels at the night sky and would like to learn to recognise constellations and identify the brightest stars by name. Step-by-step, the reader is guided through the knowledge needed to recognise key constellations, identify stars and planets, and interpret changes in the overall appearance of the sky throughout the year.1 The Constellations.- 1.1 The Viewing Location.- 1.2 Adapting the Eyes to Darkness.- 1.3 What Is the Next Step Towards Identifying Constellations and Stars?.- 1.4 Where to Start?.- 2 The Stars.- 2.1 How Far Away Are the Stars?.- 2.2 Are the Stars that Are Most Apparent in the Sky Brighter than the Others?.- 2.3 Why Do Stars Twinkle?.- 2.4 Do the Stars Move?.- 2.5 What is the Size and Mass of a Star?.- 2.6 How are Stars Formed and How Long Do they Live?.- 2.7 The Colours of the Stars.- 2.8 The Brightness of the Stars.- 2.9 Do Stars Always Have the Same Brightness?.- 2.10 Stars that are not Stars.- 3 The Celestial Sphere.- 3.1 So Just What Are the Constellations?.- 3.2 Measuring the Sky.- 3.3 What is the Ecliptic?.- 3.4 The Ecliptic and the Positions of the Planets in the Sky.- 3.5 The Ecliptic and the Signs of the Zodiac.- 3.6 How to Find Your Way Around the Sky.- 4 Identifying the Constellations and the Brightest Stars.- 4.1 Alignments of Stars.- 4.2 Sky Maps and Road Maps.- 4.3 Using Identification Maps.- 4.4 Ursa Major: The Best Starting Point.- 4.5 Identification Maps.- 5 The Sky Seen from the Southern Hemisphere.- 5.1 Other Viewing Locations.- 5.2 What Does the Sky Look Like in the Southern Hemisphere?.- 5.3 Stars that Cannot be Seen from Latitudes around 40? N.- 5.4 Characteristics of Constellations Close to the Celestial South Pole.- 5.5 The Southern Cross: A Good Starting Point.- 6 The Milky Way.- 7 Celestial Chart.- 8 The Sky and the Four Seasons of the Year.- 8.1 What To Do Next.- 8.2 Constellations with which the Reader Is Already Familiar.- Appendices.- 1 Examples of Ancient Representations of Some Colc™