hip-46618

Its story

In the serpent Hydra, the largest of all constellations, beats an orange K-type star, cooler than the Sun and warm in tone. Its glow travels around 238 years to reach us: what arrives today set out about 1788, when creoles of the American colonies were starting to read Rousseau and the French Revolution was about to set Europe ablaze. Hydra glides slowly across the southern sky, faithful to its size and silence.