Novas and Supernovas

Supernova (n.): the explosion of a star in which the star may reach a maximum intrinsic luminosity one billion times that of the sun.

An exploding star is called a nova (or, if it is a very large explosion, a supernova), which means "new" in Latin. This is because of the first person to notice a nova. In November 1572 the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe noticed a new star in the constellation Cassiopeia, where no star had previously been observed. The star was brighter than Venus but faded away after 17 months. Tycho did some calculating and found out that the star was incredibly far away. In 1573 Tycho published an account of his finds called De nova stella, translated from Latin as "On the New Star" or "About the New Star." Since then, such exploding stars have been called 'novas.'

Bibliography

Youngson, Robert. Scientific Blunders. New York: Carroll and Graf Publishers, Inc., 1998.