''Histoire céleste française'' (''French Celestial History'') is an

astrometric Astrometry is a branch of astronomy that involves precise measurements of the positions and movements of stars and other celestial bodies. It provides the kinematics and physical origin of the Solar System and this galaxy, the Milky Way. History ...

star catalogue A star catalogue is an astronomical catalogue that lists stars. In astronomy, many stars are referred to simply by catalogue numbers. There are a great many different star catalogues which have been produced for different purposes over the year ...

published in 1801 by the French astronomer

Jérôme Lalande Joseph Jérôme Lefrançois de Lalande (; 11 July 1732 – 4April 1807) was a French astronomer, freemason and writer. He is known for having estimated a precise value of the astronomical unit (the distance from the Earth to the Sun) using measu ...

and his staff at the Paris Observatory. This star catalog consists of the locations and

apparent magnitude Apparent magnitude () is a measure of the Irradiance, brightness of a star, astronomical object or other celestial objects like artificial satellites. Its value depends on its intrinsic luminosity, its distance, and any extinction (astronomy), ...

s of 47,390 stars, up to magnitude 9. Stars are identified by common name,

Bayer designation A Bayer designation is a stellar designation in which a specific star is identified by a Greek alphabet, Greek or Latin letter followed by the genitive case, genitive form of its parent constellation's Latin name. The original list of Bayer design ...

or Flamsteed designation, when available. It also contains observations of other astronomical phenomena. It was the largest and most complete star catalog of its day. This publication is a collection of several books of astronomical recordings taken over the previous decade at the observatory. A significant rewriting of this popular catalog was published by Francis Baily in 1847. It is from this catalog that the star reference numbers were assigned that continue in use to this day, such as for '' Lalande 21185''. Modern star catalogs, such as

SIMBAD SIMBAD (the Set of Identifications, Measurements and Bibliography for Astronomical Data) is an astronomy, astronomical database of objects beyond the Solar System. It is maintained by the Centre de données astronomiques de Strasbourg (CDS), Fr ...

, use the format ''LAL NNNNN'' where ''NNNNN'' is the 1847 catalog reference number, from 1 to 47390.SIMBAD
©UDS/CNRS SIMBAD Lalande stars
(retrieved 23:20, 11 September 2009).

References

External links

1801 non-fiction books Astronomical catalogues Astronomical catalogues of stars Astronomical surveys French-language works French non-fiction books {{Astronomical-catalogue-stub

References

Further reading

External links