Mebsuta

Its story

Mebsuta spreads its white A-type light 845 light-years away in the body of Gemini. Its name comes from the Arabic «Al-Mabsūṭa», «the outstretched one», referring to the extended paw of a celestial lion in a Bedouin figure that predates the Greek myth of Castor and Pollux. It is a luminous supergiant whose light, having departed when the Iberian Christian kingdoms were taking shape after the year 1000, crosses the Gould Belt — that band of young hot stars wrapping our region of the galactic disc.