Lambda Boötis is a star

Star

A star is a massive, luminous sphere of plasma held together by gravity. At the end of its lifetime, a star can also contain a proportion of degenerate matter. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun, which is the source of most of the energy on Earth...

 in the constellation

Constellation

In modern astronomy, a constellation is an internationally defined area of the celestial sphere. These areas are grouped around asterisms, patterns formed by prominent stars within apparent proximity to one another on Earth's night sky....

 Boötes

Boötes

Boötes 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 the Greek Βοώτης, Boōtēs, meaning herdsman or plowman...

.

Lambda Boötis is a white A-type

Stellar classification

In astronomy, stellar classification is a classification of stars based on their spectral characteristics. The spectral class of a star is a designated class of a star describing the ionization of its chromosphere, what atomic excitations are most prominent in the light, giving an objective measure...

 main sequence dwarf

Main sequence

The main sequence is a continuous and distinctive band of stars that appears on plots of stellar color versus brightness. These color-magnitude plots are known as Hertzsprung–Russell diagrams after their co-developers, Ejnar Hertzsprung and Henry Norris Russell...

 with an apparent magnitude

Apparent magnitude

The apparent magnitude of a celestial body is a measure of its brightness as seen by an observer on Earth, adjusted to the value it would have in the absence of the atmosphere...

 of +4.18. It is approximately 97.1 light-year

Light-year

A light-year, also light year or lightyear is a unit of length, equal to just under 10 trillion kilometres...

s from Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

. Lambda Boötis is the prototype of a group of rare stars known as Lambda Boötis star

Lambda Boötis star

A Lambda Boötis star is a type of peculiar star which has an unusually low abundance of iron peak elements in its surface layers. One possible explanation for this is that it is the result of accretion of metal-poor gas from a circumstellar disc. The prototype is Lambda Boötis....

s, all of which are dwarf stars with unusually low abundances of metals

Metallicity

In astronomy and physical cosmology, the metallicity of an object is the proportion of its matter made up of chemical elements other than hydrogen and helium...

 in their spectra. Its diameter has been directly measured to be 1.7 times that of the Sun

Sun

The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...

.

Name

This star, along with Asselus (θ Boo

Theta Boötis

Theta Boötis is a star in the constellation Boötes. It has the traditional name Asellus Primus and the Flamsteed designation 23 Boötis....

, ι Boo

Iota Boötis

Iota Boötis is a star system in the constellation Boötes. It has the traditional name Asellus Secundus and the Flamsteed designation 21 Boötis....

 and κ Boo

Kappa Boötis

Kappa Boötis is a star system in the constellation Boötes. It has the traditional name Asellus Tertius and the Flamsteed designation 17 Boötis...

), were Al Aulād al Dhiʼbah (ألعولد ألذعب - al aulād al dhiʼb), "the Whelps of the Hyenas".

Al Aulād al Dhiʼbah or Aulad al Thiba was the title of this star in the catalogue of stars in Technical Memorandum 33-507 - A Reduced Star Catalog Containing 537 Named Stars.

In Chinese astronomy

Chinese astronomy

Astronomy in China has a very long history, with historians considering that "they [the Chinese] were the most persistent and accurate observers of celestial phenomena anywhere in the world before the Arabs."...

, Lambda Boötis is called 玄戈, Pinyin

Pinyin

Pinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...

: Xuángē, meaning Sombre Lance, because this star is marking itself and stand alone in Sombre Lance asterism, Purple Forbidden enclosure

Purple Forbidden enclosure

The Purple Forbidden enclosure is one of the San Yuan or Three enclosures. Stars and constellations of this group lie near the north celestial pole and visible all year from temperate latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere.-Asterisms:The asterisms are :...

 (see : Chinese constellation

Chinese constellation

Chinese constellations are the way the ancient Chinese grouped the stars. They are very different from the modern IAU recognized constellations. This is because the IAU was based on Greco-Roman astronomy instead of Chinese astronomy....

). 玄戈 (Xuángē) westernized into Heuen Ko, but the name Heuen Ko was designated for γ Boötis

Gamma Boötis

Gamma Boötis is a star in the constellation Boötes. It has the traditional name Seginus of uncertain origin...

(Seginus) by R.H. Allen, with the meaning is "the heavenly spear"