Editing Astronomical naming conventions (section)

==== Bayer designation ====
{{main|Bayer designation|Table of stars with Bayer designations}}

The [[Bayer designation]]s of about 1,500 brightest stars were first published in 1603. In this list, a star is identified by a lower-case [[Greek alphabet#Letters|letter of the Greek alphabet]], followed by the Latin name of its parent constellation. The Bayer designation uses the possessive form of a constellation's name, which in almost every case ends in ''is'', ''i'' or ''ae''; ''um'' if the constellation's name is plural ''(see [[88 modern constellations#Modern constellations|genitive case for constellations]])''. In addition, a three-letter abbreviation is often used . Examples include [[Alpha&nbsp;Andromedae]] (''α And'') in the constellation of Andromeda, [[Alpha&nbsp;Centauri]] (''α Cen''), in the constellation Centaurus, [[Alpha&nbsp;Crucis]] (''α Cru'') and [[Beta&nbsp;Crucis]] (''β Cru''), the two brightest stars in the constellation Crux, the Southern Cross, [[Epsilon&nbsp;Carinae]] (''ε Car'') in Carina, [[Lambda&nbsp;Scorpii]] (''λ Sco'') in Scorpius  and [[Sigma&nbsp;Sagittarii]] (''σ Sgr'') in Sagittarius. After all twenty-four Greek letters have been assigned, upper and lower case Latin letters are used, such as for [[A&nbsp;Centauri]] (''A Cen''), [[D&nbsp;Centauri]] (''D Cen''), [[G&nbsp;Scorpii]] (''G Sco''), [[P Cygni]] (''P Cyg''), [[b&nbsp;Sagittarii]] (''b Sgr''), [[HD 117440|d&nbsp;Centauri]] (''d Cen'') and [[HD 90853|s&nbsp;Carinae]] (''s Car'').

As the resolving power of telescopes increased, numerous objects that were thought to be a single object were found to be optical [[star system]]s that were too closely spaced in the sky to be discriminated by the human eye. This led to a third iteration, where numeric superscripts were added to distinguish those previously unresolved stars. Examples include [[Theta Sagittarii]] (''θ Sgr'') later distinguished as Theta¹ Sagittarii (''θ¹ Sgr'') and Theta² Sagittarii (''θ² Sgr''), each being their own (physical) star system with two and three stars, respectively.