Menkar
HR 911 · HIP 14135 · α Cet
👁️ Naked-eye
📋 A written introduction is coming — for now this page shows official values only.
Star
- Apparent magnitude
- 2.53 mag
- Parallax
- 13.09 mas → about 249.2 light-years away
- Spectral type
- M2III
- Right ascension
- 45.5699°
- Declination
- 4.0897°
- Designation
- HR 911
- Bayer designation
- α Cet
- HIP number
- 14135
- IAU name adopted
- 2016-06-30
- Name language
- Arabic
- Name origin (IAU)
- From the Arabic word al-minkhar, "the nostrils," used in the Arabic Almagest in describing λ Cet. Wrongly applied as a star name to α Cet (properly on the "jaw") in a Medieval Latin star table.
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 249 years to reach Earth — the light you see tonight left around AD 1777 (official distance ÷ speed of light).
- At magnitude 2.5 it is bright enough for the naked eye (limit about 6) — look from somewhere dark.
- Declination 4.1° — 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.