Cetus

Cetus (abbreviation: Cet), the Whale or Sea Monster, is a very large constellation on the celestial equator, east of Eridanus and south of Aries and Pisces.

Cetus contains the important variables Mira and UV Ceti, the prototype UV Ceti star, and the aptly-named Skull Nebula (NGC 246). It is also home to two particularly interesting galaxies. M77 (NGC 1068) is a Seyfert galaxy, seen almost face-on, that lies about 50 million light-years away and 1° southeast of Delta Cet (magnitude 8.8; size 6.9' × 5.9'; RA 02h 42.7m, Dec -00° 01'). NGC 247 is a large, fairly bright spiral galaxy with a compact nucleus (magnitude 8.8; size 20 × 7.4 arcminutes; RA 00h 47.1m, Dec -20° 46').

M77. Hubble Space Telescope image.

See below for details of the constellation's brightest stars.

Stars brighter than magnitude 4.0
star	vis mag	abs mag	spec type	distance (ly)	RA (h m s)	Dec (° ' ")
Beta (Deneb Kaitos)	2.04	-0.30	K0IIICH	96	00 43 35	-17 59 12
Alpha (Menkar)	2.54	-1.61	M1.5IIIa	220	03 02 17	+04 05 23
Eta (Haratan)	3.45	0.67	K1.5IIICN	118	01 08 35	-10 10 56
Gamma (Kaffaljidhma)	3.47	1.47	A3V	82	02 43 18	+03 14 09
Tau Ceti	3.49	5.68	G8V	11.9	01 44 04	-15 56 15
Iota (Baten Kaitos Shemali)	3.56	-1.18	K1.5III	290	00 19 26	-08 49 26
Theta	3.60	0.87	K0IIIb	115	01 24 01	-08 11 01
Zeta (Baten Kaitos)	3.74	-0.76	K2IIIBa	259	01 51 27	-10 20 06