230 Athamantis
Also known as (230) Athamantis, Athamantis
main-belt asteroid
Picture of the Day · NASA
Jupiter and Venus from Earth
2026-06-07
It was visible around the world. The sunset conjunction of Jupiter (left) and Venus (right) in 2012 was visible almost no matter where you lived on Earth. Anyone on our planet with a clear western horizon at sunset could see them. That year, a creative photographer traveled away from the town lights of Szubin, Poland to photograph a near closest approach of the two planets. The bright planets were then separated by only three degrees and his daughter struck a humorous pose. A faint red sunset still glowed in the background. Jupiter and Venus are together again this week after sunset, passing within a degree of each other about two days from today.
© Marek Nikodem (PPSAE) · via NASA APOD
Key facts
- Discovered by
- K. de Ball
- Discovery date
- 3 September 1882
- Pronunciation
- / æ θ ə ˈ m æ n t ɪ s /
- Named after
- Helle
- Alternative designations
- 1949 WG
- Minor planet category
- Main belt
~1 min read
Article
230 Athamantis is a fairly large main-belt asteroid that was discovered by the German-Austrian astronomer K. de Ball on September 3, 1882, in Bothkamp. It was his only asteroid discovery. The asteroid was named after Athamantis, daughter of Athamas the mythical Greek king of Orchomenus.
Photometric observations of this asteroid gave a light curve with a period of 23.99 hours and a brightness variation of more than 0.20 in magnitude. It has the spectrum of an S-type asteroid. During 1991, the asteroid was observed occulting a star. The resulting chords provided a cross-section diameter estimate of 101.8 km.