Lam

Its story

Lambda Muscae is a white star flying near the southern celestial pole, in the small austral constellation of the Fly. About one hundred and twenty-seven light-years from Earth, its sharp light belongs to the deep southern sky, entirely invisible from Europe or from most of the Mediterranean coast. It is one of the beacons that Portuguese and Spanish navigators learned to recognise once they crossed the equator on the way to the Indies, when they first encountered a sky filled with constellations the ancients had never seen.