hip-99841

Its story

In Cygnus, 317 light years away, this orange K-type star glows at magnitude 5.7. Its light set out around 1708, during the War of the Spanish Succession, when the armies of Philip V and Archduke Charles were disputing Catalonia. That old light now slips between the bright stars of summer Cygnus, reminding us that every clear night is a mosaic of different eras, all arriving at the same instant of gaze.