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Its story

Horologium is a discreet southern constellation, devised by Lacaille to honour the pendulum and mechanical clocks. There glows this white A-type star — young and hot — whose brightness varies slightly over time, like a stubborn heartbeat. Its light took about 1049 years to arrive: it set out when Persian and Arab astronomers — Al-Sufi among them — were recording nebulae and galaxies with awe long before Europe rediscovered them. That white light carries that heritage with it: of those who watched the sky with endless patience.