# Athebyne (Eta Draconis)

Athebyne (Eta Draconis) is a star in the constellation Draco, magnitude 2.7.

**One of the Dragon’s two wolves, lying in wait for a camel’s foal.**

Arab stargazers saw a small drama in this part of the sky. Athebyne and its neighbour Aldhibah, Zeta Draconis, were two wolves lying in wait for a camel’s foal — a faint star guarded by the Mother Camels. Athebyne’s name is a rendering of al-dhi’bayn, “the two wolves”.

The star is a [yellow](https://astropilot.space/glossary/star-colour) giant of nearly three times the Sun’s mass. Heavier stars burn faster, so it ran out of core hydrogen after only about 650 million years; the Sun, about 4.6 billion years old, is still going. Athebyne has swollen to about 10 times the Sun’s width and shines 65 times as brightly.

A small orange dwarf, a K-type star, orbits it at least 140 times as far as Earth is from the Sun, taking at least a thousand years per lap.

Athebyne (Eta Draconis) is 92 light-years away: the light we see from it set off in 1934, 4 years after Pluto was discovered.

## Did you know?

- **The Second Premier.** In Chinese astronomy it is the third star of the Left Wall of the Purple Forbidden Enclosure, the walled region around the celestial pole, where it represents the Second Premier.
- **The female wolf.** When the IAU named the pair in 2017, Zeta Draconis became Aldhibah, “the female wolf”, and this star became Athebyne.

A yellow star of magnitude 2.7, the second-brightest in Draco, in the Dragon’s body as it curls around the Little Dipper. A steady night and high power show its 9th-magnitude companion 5 arcseconds away — a tough test because of the glare.

## When and where to see it

It is best placed in the evening sky around June, when it crosses the meridian at about 10 pm local time (around midnight in May). It can be seen from everywhere north of 28°S and never sets north of 28°N.

At its highest it stands 78° up from 50°N, 63° up from 35°N, 28° up from the equator, below the horizon from 35°S.

## Facts

- Type: Star
- Constellation: Draco
- Designations: Eta Draconis, η Dra, 14 Dra, HR 6132, HD 148387, HIP 80331
- Magnitude: 2.7
- Position: RA 16h 24.0m, Dec +61° 31′ (J2000)
- Spectral type: G8-IIIab
- Colour: orange (B−V 0.91)
- Distance: 92 light-years
- Discovered: Known since antiquity

Open AstroPilot to see when Athebyne (Eta Draconis) is highest tonight from your location, how easy it is with your telescope or binoculars, and an eyepiece view. https://astropilot.space/object/athebyne