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Quiz about Billions and Billions of Stars
Quiz about Billions and Billions of Stars

Billions and Billions of Stars Quiz


People who look at the night sky have often looked for patterns, called constellations, to help them describe all those stars. Let's look at some of the figures you can see in the night sky.

A photo quiz by looney_tunes. Estimated time: 3 mins.
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Author
looney_tunes
Time
3 mins
Type
Photo Quiz
Quiz #
375,184
Updated
Dec 03 21
# Qns
10
Difficulty
Easy
Avg Score
9 / 10
Plays
984
Awards
Top 10% Quiz
Last 3 plays: poetkah (10/10), Guest 107 (10/10), bradez (9/10).
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Question 1 of 10
1. When you look up at the night sky on a clear night, you can sometimes see what looks like a cloudy streak across the sky. What is this called? Hint


Question 2 of 10
2. The arrow in this picture is pointing to Betelgeuse, a large red star that forms the shoulder of a constellation thought to represent an ancient Greek hunter. What is its name? Hint


Question 3 of 10
3. Here is another shape in the night sky that people in the northern hemisphere find easy to recognise. Most North Americans simply call it the Big Dipper, but it is actually part of a larger constellation which the ancient observers fancied resembled a large bear. Which of these is it? Hint


Question 4 of 10
4. The two stars in the Big Dipper that form the side furthest from its handle are often called the pointers, because a line drawn through them will help you locate the star at the end of the handle of this shape, the Little Dipper. What is special about this star? Hint


Question 5 of 10
5. The three brightest stars in this image are called Altair, Deneb and Vega. What name is given for the pattern they seem to form in the sky? Hint


Question 6 of 10
6. For a change, here is a constellation that is most associated with the southern hemisphere. What is the name of the smallest of the 88 constellations which are currently recognised? Hint


Question 7 of 10
7. This map of the stars has had the shape of the constellation Cygnus drawn in. Without that line, you might find it hard to recognise that Cygnus is which of these types of animal? Hint


Question 8 of 10
8. The fifth largest of the currently recognised constellations is named after a famous Greek mythological figure who completed twelve tasks to atone for having killed his wife and children in a fit of madness. The constellation uses the Roman form of his name. Which of these is it? Hint


Question 9 of 10
9. Although he appears to be standing on his head, this map shows the constellation named after the flying horse whose mother was the gorgon Medusa, and whose father was Poseidon. What is it called? Hint


Question 10 of 10
10. The W shape of Casseopeia in the sky is easier to locate than it is to interpret as what it represents. Which of these is that? Hint



Most Recent Scores
Oct 28 2024 : poetkah: 10/10
Oct 27 2024 : Guest 107: 10/10
Sep 09 2024 : bradez: 9/10

Score Distribution

quiz
Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. When you look up at the night sky on a clear night, you can sometimes see what looks like a cloudy streak across the sky. What is this called?

Answer: The Milky Way

It is not a cloud (which the incorrect options all are), it is actually our galaxy, which is called the Milky Way because of what you see in the night sky. The galaxy is a flat spiral in shape, and our planet is near the outside of it, so if you look towards the centre of the galaxy you see so many stars that they seem to merge into a white, milky, glow, rather than standing out as individual stars.
2. The arrow in this picture is pointing to Betelgeuse, a large red star that forms the shoulder of a constellation thought to represent an ancient Greek hunter. What is its name?

Answer: Orion

According to Greek mythology, Orion was a giant, and a great hunter. There are lots of different versions of his life story, including one that says he was killed by a scorpion, which is why the constellation named after him is on the opposite side of the sky from that of Scorpio, the scorpion.

Orion is one of the easiest constellations to recognise, with the three stars forming his belt and the three stars pointing downwards from it to form his sword standing out clearly in the night sky. Orion lies close to the celestial equator, which means that it can be seen from both hemispheres. However, when I moved from the northern hemisphere to the southern one, I was surprised to find that he seemed to be standing on his head!

The star Betelgeuse (pronounced as if it were Beetle Juice), was my brother's favorite star to find and name when we were children. Mine was Rigel, the bright white star that forms Orion's foot on the side opposite to Betelgeuse (in the lower right corner of the image used for this question).
3. Here is another shape in the night sky that people in the northern hemisphere find easy to recognise. Most North Americans simply call it the Big Dipper, but it is actually part of a larger constellation which the ancient observers fancied resembled a large bear. Which of these is it?

Answer: Ursa Major

Ursa is Latin for bear, but you need a vivid imagination to see a bear up there! I just look for the portion which I recognise easily, the Big Dipper, shaped like a ladle that you might dip into a bucket of water. Astronomers call it an asterism, which means it is a pattern formed by the stars, but not a proper constellation.

In Africa, it is sometimes called a gourd rather than a dipper, while in many parts of Europe it is described as a plough or a wagon.
4. The two stars in the Big Dipper that form the side furthest from its handle are often called the pointers, because a line drawn through them will help you locate the star at the end of the handle of this shape, the Little Dipper. What is special about this star?

Answer: It is Polaris, the North Star

Like the Big Dipper, the Little Dipper is only part of a constellation - in its case, Ursa Minor, the Little Bear. The star at the end of its handle is always (very close to) directly north, so it can be used to help you find your way if you are lost at night. Because the stars are constantly moving in space, and the patterns change because of shifts in the Earth's axis of rotation, it will not always be the North Star - around 3000 CE, the pole star will be Gamma Cephei.
5. The three brightest stars in this image are called Altair, Deneb and Vega. What name is given for the pattern they seem to form in the sky?

Answer: Summer Triangle

Altair is the brightest star in the constellation of Aquila, Deneb of Cygnus and Vega of Lyra. (I won't translate these names, as we will be seeing at least one of them again.) In the northern hemisphere, the Summer Triangle can be seen overhead and quite bright during the summer, but is also appears in the eastern sky during spring, and in the western sky during autumn. For those of us who live in the southern hemisphere, it is visible (upside down, and low in the sky rather than overhead) during our winter.

There is a Chinese legend, 'The Weaver Girl and the Cowherd', dating over 2500 years ago, which refers to this pattern. Vega is called the Weaver Girl Star, and Altair the Cowherd Star. These two love each other deeply, but this was forbidden, and they were doomed to stay separate in the sky except for one day a year, when magpies form a bridge to join them briefly.
6. For a change, here is a constellation that is most associated with the southern hemisphere. What is the name of the smallest of the 88 constellations which are currently recognised?

Answer: Crux

The word crux is Latin for cross. While the ancient Greeks could see these stars, they considered them to be part of the larger constellation of Centaurus. By around 400 BCE, the motion of the stars in the sky had led to it only being visible from the southern hemisphere (unless you are very near the equator, in which case you will see it for a few hours a night, barely above the horizon, in winter months).

The five brightest stars in Crux are usually called the Southern Cross, a pattern which is used on the national flags of a number of countries, including Australia and New Zealand.
7. This map of the stars has had the shape of the constellation Cygnus drawn in. Without that line, you might find it hard to recognise that Cygnus is which of these types of animal?

Answer: Swan

It is obviously a bird, and the long neck should help you identify it as a swan. Although it seems to me that a goose would be just as good a description, the ancients had a nice myth (actually, several of them) to go along with calling it a swan. You can see Deneb, part of the Summer Triangle, near the centre of Cygnus. Deneb is one end of a shape called the Northern Cross, which is part of Cygnus.

Many find this easier to locate than Cygnus in its entirety.
8. The fifth largest of the currently recognised constellations is named after a famous Greek mythological figure who completed twelve tasks to atone for having killed his wife and children in a fit of madness. The constellation uses the Roman form of his name. Which of these is it?

Answer: Hercules

Herakles, as the Greeks called him, was constantly harassed by Hera, his stepmother. At one point, she induced him to kill his family in a frenzy, an act which he bitterly regretted when he came to his senses. She arranged for him to complete Twelve Labours as penance, then did her best to make them impossible for him.

He is shown in the constellation as kneeling, supposedly because he is in the midst of appealing to Zeus to help him defeat two giants in a battle that occurred after he had completed his tenth task.
9. Although he appears to be standing on his head, this map shows the constellation named after the flying horse whose mother was the gorgon Medusa, and whose father was Poseidon. What is it called?

Answer: Pegasus

Pegasus and Chrysaor were twins, born when Perseus decapitated their mother, who was pregnant to Poseidon, the god of horses and of the sea. Pegasus was captured by Bellerophon, who rode him to fight against the Chimera. When Bellerophon asked Pegasus to fly him to Olympus, the hero fell off and plummeted to earth (either because Zeus threw a thunderbolt to block the way, or because Pegasus bucked him off in deference to the wishes of the Olympian gods). Zeus turned Pegasus into a constellation, to fly through the night skies forever.
10. The W shape of Casseopeia in the sky is easier to locate than it is to interpret as what it represents. Which of these is that?

Answer: A seated woman

Cassiopeia was an Ethiopian queen, who bragged that she (or, in some versions, her daughter Andromeda) was more beautiful than the Nereids. As punishment, she and Andromeda were placed in the sky, where the throne in which she is half-sitting, half-reclining rotates around the North Star. For half the year, she is upside down (and looks like an M instead of a W), and must hang on for dear life lest she fall to the earth.
Source: Author looney_tunes

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor NatalieW before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.
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