Pegasus, resembles the shape of a winged horse, when stars in this constellation are imaginarily connected!
Where should I see…
Vulpecula, Delphinus, Equuleus and Cygnus, are towards west of Pegasus constellation. If you move
your eyes towards east, you will see other constellation named Andromeda and Pisces. In the North and South of Pegasus, you will find Lacerta and Aquarius constellations respectively. Pegasus is near to celestial equator towards North Pole, and so is fully part of Northern Hemisphere.
It covers up 1121 square degree area of the sky. Area wise it is 7th largest constellation in the sky.
When and What can I see…
We can gaze at this shape of Pegasus constellation from May to December, as seen from India.
All you need is your naked eyes other than clear skies to see 175 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 star. The brightest star of this constellation is Enif. The Hindu name of Stars Markab and Algenib are Poorva Bhadrapad and uttara Bhadrapad respectively, which are also known as Nakshatra (lunar mansion).
Constellations are made up of single, binary (apparent and absolute), multiple and variable stars. Out of total 175 stars of different types, here is the list of 20 brightest stars as per their nature:
| Binary / Multiple Star system |
Variable Stars |
Binary/multiple and Variable Stars |
Single stars |
| Homam |
Markab |
Enif |
Sadalbari |
| 4 |
Biham |
Scheat |
Alkarab |
| – |
Salm |
Algenib |
3 |
| – |
2 |
Matar |
– |
| – |
– |
1 |
– |
| 5 |
5 |
5 |
5 |
Mythology stories…
As per Hindu mythology, there are no such known stories for this constellation.
Deep Sky Objects…
NGC 7217 || Spiral Galaxy
NGC 7331 || Spiral Galaxy
NGC 7479 || Spiral Galaxy
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 Starscluster 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 455 such different types of Deep Sky Objects observed. Below is the list of 20 brightest Deep Sky Objects:
NGC 7673 || Spiral Galaxy
Fried Egg Galaxy or NGC 7742 || Spiral Galaxy
NGC 7814 || Spiral Galaxy
| |
Galaxy |
Open Cluster |
Globular Cluster |
Nebula |
Supernova Remnant |
|
| Naked eye visibility |
– |
– |
M15 (great Pegasus cluster) |
– |
– |
|
|
| Visible through Telescope |
19 |
– |
– |
– |
– |
|
|
|
| |
19 |
– |
1 |
– |
– |
|
Pease 1 || Planetary Nebula
Stephans Quintet || Visual Grouping of 5 galaxies
NGC 1 || Spiral Galaxy
