Talk:Comet of 1729

'Great Comet' - renaming

I'm not sure that this should be called the 'Great Comet of 1729': a Google Books search for this phrase gives only 20 results - none of them especially authoritative - whereas 'Comet of 1729' gives 211 results.

The thing is, despite being the largest comet in history, it was only just visible to the naked eye - hardly a 'Great Comet'. I suspect that any sources describing it as such are doing this in error based on the fact that the nucleus was so large, they assume it to have had a large apparent magnitude. In fact it didn't ever appear to us as more than a faint, fuzzy blob and indeed very few people (other than Cassini) paid much attention to it. The most authoritative sources all refer to it as the Comet of 1729, or comet Sarabat - I'll rename the page accordingly. Svejk74 (talk) 09:43, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

I absolutely agree. — Chesnok (talk) 10:50, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Sarabat

By the way, it should be noted that Sarabat's name is usually spelt Sarrabat in sources outisde astronomy. He was a Jesuit father, mathematician and sceintist who conducted expermients on plants, electromagnetism, and a few other things. His full name was Nicolas Sarrabat de la Baisse, and a genus of plants (Baissea) is named after him. I have given a few details in a footnote, until such time as someone decides to give him his own article.

Most astronomy sources use the spelling 'Sarabat' as this is how Cassini, who made the most observations of the comet, spelt it. This is the convention I have followed in the article.Svejk74 (talk) 09:57, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

I created a page for him. Svejk74 (talk) 15:56, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Do sources refer to it as "Comet Sarabat"? I have seen references to "Sarabat's Comet". Either or both should redirect to this page, in any case. 68.100.27.173 (talk) 19:43, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

Ambiguous "Non-Periodic"

As noted in the Comet page, "Non-Periodic" is used in different ways by different astronomers. It may mean a long-period comet which will return, or a single-apparition comet which has left the Solar System never to return. This article should use more specific language, instead of the vague "non-periodic". 2601:441:4680:3230:D9F2:CAB:6FF1:473E (talk) 18:56, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

I made some edits to the article. But with such a limited dataset, and an assumed eccentricity of 1.0, it is unknown if the comet will return on the order of a 100000 years or be ejected from the Solar System. -- Kheider (talk) 20:24, 27 May 2019 (UTC)