Circinus (Parkar)
Circinus, resembles the shape of a compass, when stars in this constellation are imaginarily connected, as per Indian mythology!
Where should I see…Centaurus and Musca, is the constellation which is towards west of Circinus
constellation. If you move your eyes towards east, you will see another constellation named Triangulum Australe and Norma. In the North and South of Circinus, you will find Lupus and Apus constellations. Circinus is near South Pole, and so is fully part of Southern Hemisphere.
It covers up 95 square degree area of the sky. Area wise it is 85th largest constellation in the sky.
We can gaze at this compass shape of Circinus constellation from September to May, as seen from India.
When and What can I see…All you need is your naked eyes other than clear skies to see 34 stars of this
constellations, as they are the one which are brighter than the lower limit of our naked eyes (i.e. 6.5 apparent magnitude) to see faintest stars. The brightest star of this constellation is Alpha Circini.
Constellations are made up of single, binary (apparent and absolute), multiple and variable stars. Out of total 34 stars of different types, here is the list of 20 brightest stars as per their nature:
| Binary / Multiple Star system | Variable Stars | Binary and Variable Stars | Single stars |
| 7 | 1 | 3 | 9 |
Mythology stories…
As per Hindi mythology, there are no such known stories for this constellation.
Deep Sky Objects…
Circinus Galaxy || Seyfert Galaxy
Circinus C-1 || Binary star system contains neutron star
NGC 5715 || Open Cluster
NGC 5315 || Planetary Nebula
All the stars that we see naked eyes, all belong to our own, Milky way galaxy (Akash Ganga Tara Vishv). Bright stars can be seen naked eye and faint one through telescope. But the curtain of sky that we see in 2D is actually a huge universe we are talking about, with 3 dimension. There are many nebulous objects visible in every constellations. They differ widely by distances and nature. Like Emission Nebula, Reflecting Nebula, Absorption Nebula, Star Birth Nebula, Supernova Remnants (SNR) and Open Stars cluster which are within the disk of our own Milky Way galaxy. Globular cluster are also found, which are in the halo of our galaxy and some most distant objects like galaxies are also visible through telescope. Such objects are defined as “Deep Sky Objects”.
In this constellation there are 5 such different types of Deep Sky Objects observed. Below is the list of 20 brightest Deep Sky Objects:
NGC 5823 || Open Cluster
Pismis 20 || open Cluster
PSR-B1509-58 || Pulsar
| Galaxy | Open Cluster | Globular Cluster | Nebula | Supernova Remnant | ||
| Naked eye visibility | – | – | – | – | – | |
| Visible through Telescope | – | 4 | – | 1 | – | |
| – | 4 | – | 1 | – |