Sualocin and Rotanev
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sualocin (α Delphini) and Rotanev (β Delphini) are names of stars, the result of an enduring practical joke played by the Italian astronomer Niccolò Cacciatore (1780–1841). Cacciatore worked as an assistant to Giuseppe Piazzi, head of the Palermo Astronomical Observatory, while Piazzi was compiling a star catalogue. When the Palermo Catalogue was published in 1814, the names Sualocin and Rotanev appeared in the catalogue without explanation; eventually the astronomer Thomas William Webb pointed out that they were reversals of Cacciatore's Latinized name (Nicolaus Venator.)