name ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Proper Noun

1. 1
   A telescopic binary star, visually the brightest star in the night sky, a part of the northern constellation of Canis Major (the Greater Dog), one of three stars in the Winter Triangle asterism. Long understood as a single extremely luminous white star, it was associated in ancient Egypt with the Nile flood and in Greek and Roman culture with the "dog days" of summer.
2. 2
   The brightest star of the aforementioned star system; the white main-sequence star Sirius A. specifically

Synonyms

All synonyms

alpha canis majorisblazing starcaniculacometdaystardog star

Example

More examples

"The orbit around Sirius is elliptical."

Etymology

From Latin Sīrius, from Ancient Greek Σείριος (Seírios), usually taken from σείριος (seírios, “scorching; scorcher”).

Related phrases

binary star systemcanis majordog dayswinter hexagon

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.