Alkaid

Its story

Alkaid closes the handle of the Big Dipper, the last sentinel of the seven-star procession that has guided generations toward the north. Its name, from the Arabic «al-qā'id», means «the leader» — or, in the older reading, «the chief of the mourners» in the funeral cortege medieval imagination saw in the constellation. A hot blue-white youngster 104 light-years away, it burns with the clean fury of a B-class star.