14 Irene

History

Irene was discovered by English astronomer John R. Hind on the very early morning of 20 May 1851 from George Bishop's Observatory in London, England. At that time, he was observing near the star Lalande 29490, around the 16th hour of right ascension and 10–15°S of declination in the constellation of Scorpius. For several years prior, he had examined this region of the sky as a nearby star had been erroneously omitted from Wölfer's star charts. Near Lalande 29490, Xi Scorpii, and 50 Librae, he noticed a pale blue object of about the ninth magnitude that had not been recorded before. Since such an object was unlikely to have gone unnoticed in prior sweeps of the area, he quickly suspected its non-stellar nature. This was confirmed by follow-up observations throughout that morning, and Hind announced his discovery of a new planet through The London Times on 21 May 1851. Further announcements of the discovery were published by journals such as Astronomische Nachrichten on 2 June 1851 and The Astronomical Journal on 5 June 1851. Irene was the fourth asteroid discovered by Hind and the fourteenth discovered in history. Hind would go on to discover a further six asteroids.

Naming

Irene was named after Irēnē, a personification of peace in Greek mythology. She was one of the Horae, daughter of Zeus and Themis. The name was suggested by Sir John Herschel. Hind wrote, :"You will readily discover that this name [...] has some relation to this event (the Great Industrial Exhibition) which is now filling our metropolis [London] with the talent of all civilised nations, with those of Peace, the productions of Art and Science, in which all mankind must feel an interest." The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations in the Crystal Palace of Hyde Park, London, ran from 1 May until 18 October 1851.

Symbol

Hind suggested that the symbol for the asteroid should be "A dove carrying an olive-branch, with a star on its head", but it was hardly drawn before the use of graphical symbols to represent asteroids was dropped entirely. It was included in Unicode 17.0 as U+1CEC7 𜻇 ([[File:Irene symbol (fixed width).svg|12px|class=skin-invert]]).

Orbit

Irene orbits the Sun at an average distance, or semi-major axis, of 2.59 astronomical units (AU), placing it in the main asteroid belt. Along its 4.16 year long orbit, its distance from the Sun varies from 2.17 AU at perihelion to 3.01 AU at aphelion due to its orbital eccentricity of 0.16. Its orbit is inclined by 9° with respect to the ecliptic plane, and it does not belong to any known asteroid family, classifying it as a background asteroid.

Notes

References

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References

1. Noah Webster (1884) ''A Practical Dictionary of the English Language''
2. [http://aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/docs/minorplanets.php When did the asteroids become minor planets?] {{webarchive. link. (2007-09-21)
3. Hind, John Russell. (1852). "From a Letter of Mr. Hind to the Editor". Astronomical Journal.
4. Schmadel, Lutz D.. (2003). "Dictionary of minor planet names". [[Springer-Verlag]].
5. (18 September 2023). "Unicode request for historical asteroid symbols". Unicode.