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Description
In 1879 Benjamin Apthorp Gould published in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the Uranometria Argentina catalog of 7756 stars south of declination +10 degrees. This included all those stars he considered magnitude 7 or brighter and some fainter stars which are close companions to brighter stars or to each other and have combined magnitude 7 or brighter. Star positions are in 1875 coordinates, and constellation boundaries also in 1875 coordinates were defined within the aforementioned declination range. With only a few small changes these were incorporated into the boundaries adopted by the IAU in 1930 and subsequently universally accepted. In terms of accurate photoelectric magnitude measurements the Uranometria Argentina is nearly complete to magnitude 6.5 in its declination range. In each constellation the individual stars considered to be magnitude 7 and brighter were numbered in sequence of increasing right ascension in 1875 coordinates, except that in a few cases this sequence was somewhat adjusted so that stars close together could be listed on adjacent lines of text. The numbering system is analogous to that in the Flamsteed Catalogus Brittanicus and now widely used. Star numbers from the Uranometria Argentina rarely appear in the 21st century despite the potential utility of their use. They were included in the American Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac until 1978, and in the FK5 catalog until 1999, always with the letter G following the number in the Uranometria Argentina catalog. This serves to distinguish Flamsteed numbers with no following letters from Gould numbers, and is utilized in this presentation and recommended for general use. The file catalog.dat includes every star in the original Uranometria Argentina. In the original the constellations were presented in sequence of increasing distance from the south pole and numbered accordingly. For the convenience of 21st century astronomers the constellations are presented here by alphabetical sequence in constellation name and the stars in each constellation in the same sequence as in the original. A separate file notes.txt includes a large number of notes for individual stars and for groups of stars recognized in the original catalog as belonging together. Each note is referenced by an asterisk * in the file catalog.dat. Columns 43-63 provide J2000 coordinates and cross identifications from the Flamsteed, HD, and SAO catalogs for the stars and have been added by the author of this data set. Columns 82-154 have been copied verbatim from the Uranometria Argentina catalogue, except that where asterisks are shown errors in the original printed catalogue have been corrected and the originally published values are stated in the notes. Two publications state corrections to the printed Uranometria Argentina. These are by B.A. Gould, Astronomische Nachrichten 116, 379-382 (1887AN....116..379G), and by T. W. Backhouse, Astronomical Journal 12, 112 (1892AJ.....12Q.112B). All of these, and a few others, mostly typographical misprints found by the present author, are presented in this digital version.
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