Phoenix

Phoenix is a Southern Hemisphere constellation otherwise known as the Fire Bird. It is one of twelve constellations created around 1597 by Petrus Plancius (Wikipedia)from observations by the Dutch navigators Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman. Phoenix remains one of the 88 modern constellations defined by the International Astronomical Union (Wikipedia).

Phoenix (abbrev. = Phe; genitive = Phoenicis) covers 469 square degrees or 1.14% of the celestial sphere making it the 37th largest constellation. It contains 71 stars brighter than apparent magnitude 6.5, the brightest star being Ankaa.

For more information see the entries for Phoenix at Wikipedia and U. Wisconsin. For a chart of Phoenix, see Phe (IAU).


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