Star profile
Sham
Alpha Sagitta · Sagitta
What is Sham
Sham is the head of the little Arrow, one of the tiniest constellations in the sky, already catalogued by Ptolemy. Its name, from the Arabic «As-Sahm», means precisely «the arrow». It is a yellow G-type giant 425 light-years away: the light seen tonight set out when Cervantes had just published the first part of Don Quixote. The Arrow crosses the Milky Way like a dart thrown by some forgotten hand, piercing the river of stars of the northern summer.
Where it is and when to see it
Sham lies in the northern celestial hemisphere. It is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky. Its best month of the year is July: the Sun sits at the opposite point of the sky and the star culminates around midnight. How high it climbs above the horizon depends on the latitude you watch from.
It opens in your browser. Free, no account, nothing to install.
The signature wall
Stelvia's sky works like a signature wall: anyone can leave their name and a message on a real star, and that signature goes up on the map for everyone to read. Signing is free.
A signature without a lock can be replaced by someone else's. The lock makes the signature permanent and lets you choose a symbolic name for the star, always shown next to the star's catalogue identifier. How the lock works
If you don't have an account yet, we'll ask for an email to confirm it's you: we send you a link and that's it, no password.
A public signature from a real person. The chosen name is a symbolic denomination within Stelvia, with no official standing or IAU recognition: the sky is not for sale and belongs to no one.
Astronomical data for Sham
- Constellation
- Sagitta
- Apparent magnitude
- 4.39
- Distance
- 425.3 light years
- Coordinates (J2000)
- RA 295.024° · Dec 18.014°
- Catalogue
- HIP 96757 · HD 185758
A symbolic commemorative gift: neither the signature nor the chosen name implies ownership of the star or recognition by the IAU.
Other stars in Sagitta
Sagitta has 14 stars in Stelvia's catalogue. Here are a few of them.
- Gamma Sagitta3.51
- Delta Sagitta3.68
- Beta Sagitta4.39
- Zeta Sagitta5.01
- Eta Sagitta5.09
- 13 Sagitta5.33
- 11 Sagitta5.54
- 1 Sagitta5.65