celestial pole
1
8.8
- noun
- /səˈlɛstʃəl poʊl/
- Specialized
:
polo celeste
- Astronomers can pinpoint the north celestial pole by locating the bright star Polaris.
- the north celestial pole
- the position of the celestial pole
But because they're so far South, that would mean that, you know, just thinking about it in this way is that the celestial S celestial pole is really high.
- But because they're so far South, that would mean that, you know, just thinking about it in this way is that the celestial S celestial pole is really high.
Examples
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Buntings orient by the celestial pole on both legs of their migration.
Academic text (1995) -
Indigo buntings steer north by looking for star patterns near the north celestial pole.
Academic text (1995) -
So you can determine the north celestial pole, or you can look at where the sun is and what time of the year it is.
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OK, so the north celestial pole precesses in a circle on the sky, right?
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The mount would be plumbed to vertical and aligned very carefully with the north celestial pole.
Academic text (2002) -
They're circling around the celestial poles, which are the points directly above the North and South pole in the sky.
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Viewed from the north celestial pole, this east-west array traces out the area of a circle over 12 hours.
Academic text (1996) -
Because I have pointed the camera toward the northern sky, the stars will appear to move in a counterclockwise circle around the north celestial pole (approximately defined by the star Polaris, also known as the North Star).
Academic text (2011) -
Indigo buntings will be able to locate the celestial pole thousands of years from now, even though precession will have altered the circumpolar star patterns compared to the sky of today.
Academic text (1995) -
I could approximate a transit scope by turning off my mount's clock drive and reorienting the mount so the telescope is constrained to rotate along a line including the zenith and the north celestial pole.
Academic text (2002)
Surface Forms
Morphology
The noun phrase is a straightforward composition of 'celestial' (relating to the sky/space) and 'pole' (an axis endpoint), so the meaning — the pole on the celestial sphere where the Earth's axis intersects — is directly inferable. This modifier+noun pattern is literal and cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents should be able to understand it.
Etymology
Celestial pole comes from a simple image: celestial means 'sky' and pole is the point where Earth's 'spin' line meets that sky. So, it now means the point in the sky around which the stars seem to turn.