Boötes (/boʊˈoʊtiːz/ boh-OH-teez) is a constellation in the northern sky, located between 0° and +60° declination, and 13 and 16 hours of right ascension on the celestial sphere.

The name comes from Latin: Boōtēs, which comes from Ancient Greek: Βοώτης, romanized: Boṓtēs 'herdsman' or 'plowman' (literally, 'ox-driver'; from βοῦς boûs 'cow').

They were apparently depicted as the god Enlil, who was the leader of the Babylonian pantheon and special patron of farmers.

[4] Homer mentions Boötes in the Odyssey as a celestial reference for navigation,[5] describing it as "late-setting" or "slow to set".

According to one version, he was a son of Demeter,[7] Philomenus, twin brother of Plutus, a plowman who drove the oxen in the constellation Ursa Major.

To verify that the guest was really the king of the gods, Lycaon killed his grandson and prepared a meal made from his flesh.

Zeus noticed and became very angry, transforming Lycaon into a wolf and giving life back to his son.

Arcturus, the name of the constellation's brightest star, comes from the Greek word meaning "guardian of the bear".

[14] It was originally called Le Mural by Jean Fortin in his 1795 Atlas Céleste; it was not given the name Quadrans Muralis until Johann Bode's 1801 Uranographia.

[citation needed] Two constellations flanked Daijiao: Yousheti to the right and Zuosheti to the left; they represented companions that orchestrated the seasons.

Dixi, the Emperor's ceremonial banquet mat, was north of Arcturus, consisting of the stars 12, 11 and 9 Boötis.

[17] Boötes is a constellation bordered by Virgo to the south, Coma Berenices and Canes Venatici to the west, Ursa Major to the northwest, Draco to the northeast, and Hercules, Corona Borealis and Serpens Caput to the east.

[18] The official constellation boundaries, as set by Belgian astronomer Eugène Delporte in 1930, are defined by a polygon of 16 segments.

[16] By 1801, when Johann Bode published his Uranographia, Boötes had acquired a sickle, which was also held in his left hand.

[26] It is a 2.68-magnitude star 37 light-years distant with a spectral class of G0IV,[27] indicating it has just exhausted its core hydrogen and is beginning to expand and cool.

[29] Marking the herdsman's head is Beta Boötis,[26] or Nekkar, a yellow giant of magnitude 3.5 and spectral type G8IIIa.

[46] Scientists have had difficulty explaining the characteristics of Lambda Boötis stars, partly because only around 60 confirmed members exist, but also due to heterogeneity in the literature.

Another eclipsing binary star is ZZ Boötis, which has two F2-type components of almost equal mass,[47] and ranges in magnitude from a minimum of 6.79 to a maximum of 7.44 over a period of 5.0 days.

Tau Boötis b, the sole planet discovered in the system, orbits at a distance of 0.046 AU every 3.31 days.

It is smaller than the Sun, with a mass of 0.84 M☉ and a radius of 0.73 R☉; it also appears below the threshold of naked-eye visibility at an apparent magnitude of 7.51.

[69] Boötes is in a part of the celestial sphere facing away from the plane of our home Milky Way galaxy, and so does not have open clusters or nebulae.

[80] NGC 5698 is a barred spiral galaxy, notable for being the host of the 2005 supernova SN 2005bc, which peaked at magnitude 15.3.

The Hercules–Corona Borealis Great Wall, the largest-known structure in the Universe, covers a significant part of Boötes.

[83] The radiant is located in northern Boötes near Kappa Boötis,[84] in its namesake former constellation of Quadrans Muralis.

[86][87] 2003 EH1 is a short-period comet of the Jupiter family; 500 years ago, it experienced a catastrophic breakup event.

[89] Meteors from this shower often appear to have a blue hue and travel at a moderate speed of 41.5–43 kilometers per second.

[94] The shower, with its slow meteors, was not observed prior to 1916 because Earth did not cross the comet's dust trail until Jupiter perturbed Pons–Winnecke's orbit, causing it to come within 0.03 AU (4.5 million km; 2.8 million mi) of Earth's orbit the first year the June Bootids were observed.

[98] Typically, only 1–2 dim, very slow meteors are visible per hour; the average June Bootid has a magnitude of 5.0.

[99] The June Bootids are classified as a class III shower (variable),[100] and has an average entry velocity of 18 kilometers per second.

[106] The Lambda Bootids, part of the Bootid-Coronae Borealid Complex, are a weak annual shower with moderately fast meteors; 41.75 km/s.