Merga

Its story

Merga is a yellow-white F-type star in Boötes, lying 160 light-years away. Its name comes from the Arabic «Al-Marāqq», «the loin», and some medieval translations also called it «the bound handmaiden». It belongs to the group of fainter stars surrounding the bright Arcturus and completing the outline of the celestial herdsman. The light seen tonight set out when the Lumière brothers had not yet invented cinema: a century and a half of silent travel through the void.