Orion, the hunter

Orion is one of the few star patterns almost anyone can pick out: a bright rectangle with three stars in a row across its middle. Red Betelgeuse marks his shoulder, blue-white Rigel his foot.

Where is it from where I am?

How to spot it: Three bright stars in a short straight row: Orion's belt. Source (opens in a new tab)

The figure

Ian Ridpath (opens in a new tab) calls Orion the most splendid of constellations. His right shoulder and left foot are Betelgeuse and Rigel, and three stars in a line form his belt. For all its fame it is only the 26th largest of the 88 constellations; the brilliance of its stars makes it look bigger.

An ancient pattern

Orion is among the few star groups known to Homer and Hesiod (opens in a new tab), and the Sumerians knew the stars too. The Greek story of his death by a scorpion is told on its own page.

The Orion Nebula

Below the belt hangs a fuzzy patch that is not a star: the Orion Nebula (opens in a new tab), a stellar nursery about 1,500 light-years away where new stars are forming now. It can be seen with the naked eye, and binoculars show it well.

Everywhere but the far north and south

Orion straddles the celestial equator, so from almost every inhabited place on Earth the whole figure rises. The computed ranges below give the details; from the Southern Hemisphere he appears upside down, belt and all.

In other traditions

Vedic astrology places two lunar mansions here: Mrigashira and Ardra. For some Māori iwi, Rigel is Puanga, star of the new year.

Where on Earth, and when

The whole key pattern rises from anywhere between about 83°S and 80°N.

Its middle climbs at least 20° high, the finder's threshold for a suggestion, from latitudes between 71°S and 69°N.

It is highest in the evening sky, at about 9 p.m. local time, in mid-January, from either hemisphere, wherever it rises. With daylight saving time, that is nearer 10 p.m. on the clock.

Worked out by this site from the Bright Star Catalogue, for a flat, clear horizon. Hills, buildings, haze and city light all cut into this; the air also lifts objects near the horizon by about half a degree. For your own place and night, use the sky finder.