vernal point
vernal point noun: the point on the ecliptic where the sun crosses from the southern celestial hemisphere to the northern, which occurs at the (northern) vernal equinox; less commonly, either this point or the opposite point of crossing from north to south.
Noun
vernal point (plural vernal points)
- The point on the ecliptic where the sun crosses from the southern celestial hemisphere to the northern, which occurs at the (northern) vernal equinox; less commonly, either this point or the opposite point of crossing from north to south.
- In principle, the function is symmetrical with respect to the vernal points, the axes λ_H = 0° and λ_H = 180°.1970, M. A. Hoskin, editor, Journal for the History of Astronomy, volumes 1-2, page 24
- Hipparchus found that the ecliptic coordinates of fixed stars (i.e. the longitudes counted from the vernal point and the latitudes) behave in the same way as the ecliptic coordinates of the sun: the longitudes are always increasing, the latitudes remain constant.1975, Otto Neugebauer, A History of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy, Springer, page 1083
Forms of vernal point
| plural | vernal points |
|---|
Questions about vernal point
- What does vernal point mean?
- Vernal point means the point on the ecliptic where the sun crosses from the southern celestial hemisphere to the northern, which occurs at the (northern) vernal equinox; less commonly, either this point or the opposite point of crossing from north to south.
- What part of speech is vernal point?
- Vernal point is a noun.
- What is the plural of vernal point?
- The plural of vernal point is vernal points.
Words near vernal point in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: vernal point (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “vernal point.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/vernal_point. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.