Aries discovery

Minor planet discovered in Aries.

Ruins of Aeclanum, a Roman town in Irpinia district, now Avellino, Campania. The ruin stands in a green park with trees in the background. A diamond patterning is visible on most of the walls, alongside thinly layered horizontal reddish bricks.
Aries discovery, Asteroids, Central main belt objects, Focus On, Main belt objects

Focus On: (377) Campania

Name origin: Campania, a region of south-west Italy. Occupied by several Italic tribes since the beginning of the 1st millennium BCE. The Etruscans and Greeks established colonies in the Campanian Plains and in Naples respectively, before it became part of the Roman republic by the end of the 4th century BCE.

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Filippino Lippi (1457-1504): Five Sibyls Seated in Niches: the Samian, Cumean, Hellespontic, Phrygian and Tiburtine, c. 1465-1470.
Aries discovery, Asteroids, Cybele group, Focus On, Main belt objects, Outer main belt objects

Focus On: (168) Sibylla

Named after the Sibyls, oracles in ancient Greece. Originally there may have been just one Sibyl at a time, but the number eventually increased to nine or ten. Bases included Delphi, Samos, Delos and Clarus. The etymology of the term’s source is unknown.

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Detail of Heimdall returns Brísingamen to Freyja (1846), oil painting by Nils Blommér.
Aries discovery, Asteroids, Cybele group, Focus On, Main belt objects, Outer main belt objects

Focus On: (76) Freia

Freyja is a Norse goddess associated with love, sex, beauty, fertility, gold, seiðr, war, and death. Freyja is the owner of the necklace Brísingamen, rides a chariot pulled by two cats, is accompanied by the boar Hildisvíni, and possesses a cloak of falcon feathers. She is a member of the Vanir.

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Detail of Wounded Eurydice (1868-70), oil on canvas painting by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot.
Aries discovery, Asteroids, Central main belt objects, Focus On, Main belt objects

Focus On: (75) Eurydike

Name origin: Greek daughter of Apollo and wife of Orpheus. The main myth concerning Eurydike involves her death by snake bite, and Orpheus’ subsequent attempt to bring her back from the underworld, which failed at the last moment.

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Mosaic of Polyphemos and Galatea, Alcázar de los Reyes Cristianos.
Aries discovery, Asteroids, Central main belt objects, Focus On, Main belt objects

Focus On: (74) Galatea

Name origin: Greek – either a Nereid, or a mortal formed from a statue. Galateia was one of the fifty Nereides and the goddess of calm seas, wooed by Polyphemos with music, milk and cheese.

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Floor mosaic at the House of Mnemosyne in Antioch, dated 2nd-3rd century CE. The goddess places her hand on the back of a man's head, symbolically aiding his memory.
Aries discovery, Asteroids, Focus On, Main belt objects, Outer main belt objects

Focus On: (57) Mnemosyne

Name origin: Greek Goddess of memory. In the Greek tradition, Mnemosyne is one of the Titans, the twelve divine children of the earth-goddess Gaia and the sky-god Uranus. She is also the mother of the nine Muses by her nephew Zeus.

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Italo Gismondi's (1887-1974) scale model of the Capitoline Hill under Constantine, on which stood a temple to Fides, at the Museum of Roman Civilisation.
Aries discovery, Asteroids, Central main belt objects, Focus On, Main belt objects

Focus On: (37) Fides

Name origin: Roman goddess of trust and good faith (bona fides). One of the original virtues to be considered an actual religious divinity. She is everything that is required for “honour and credibility, from fidelity in marriage, to contractual arrangements, and the obligation soldiers owed to Rome.”

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