Brachium
HR 5603 · HIP 73714 · σ Lib
👁️ Naked-eye
📋 A written introduction is coming — for now this page shows official values only.
Star
- Apparent magnitude
- 3.21 mag
- Parallax
- 11.31 mas → about 288.4 light-years away
- Spectral type
- M3/M4III
- Right ascension
- 226.0176°
- Declination
- -25.282°
- Designation
- HR 5603
- Bayer designation
- σ Lib
- HIP number
- 73714
- IAU name adopted
- 2017-09-05
- Name language
- Graeco-Latin
- Name origin (IAU)
- For Bayer (1603), this star is γ Scorpii with no proper name but in the register for the Scorpius-star chart, he lists "Virgilius brachium" among other (Greek and Arabic) designations for this star. Allen (1899, 368/9) that Vergil had not meant it as a star name but only as a marker for the "claws", so it was never meant as a proper name.
Source:IAU Working Group on Star Names · checked 2026-11-02 ↗ESA Hipparcos Catalogue (ESA Gaia Archive) · checked 2026-11-03 ↗
Related
Constellation
In everyday life
- Light from this object takes about 288 years to reach Earth — the light you see tonight left around AD 1738 (official distance ÷ speed of light).
- At magnitude 3.2 it is bright enough for the naked eye (limit about 6) — look from somewhere dark.
- Declination -25.3° — it rises above the horizon in Seoul (37.6° N), so it is visible from Korea in the right season.
Worked out from this object's official values.