> Until 1850, the planet Uranus was originally known in England by which name?And the answer: George's Star. Photo credit: public domain.In 1781, the astronomer William Herschel discoveredthat the celestial object we know today as Uranus wasn't a star, but rather aplanet. He named it after England's King George III. However those outsideBritain didn't appreciate the name, and nearly 70 years later it was changed toUranus, after the Greek god of the sky.March 13, 1781 marks the first discovery of a planet since antiquity, as well asthe birth of a new era of astronomical learning. Herschel's discovery of Uranusinvited scientists to do what he had done: to go outside, equipped with atelescope, and look up. Before Herschel, Uranus had been observed on many occasions. Rudimentarytelescopes and clear skies revealed the faint, slowly rotating planet. As such,the planet was thought to be a star for millennia. The earliest knownobservation of Uranus comes from Hipparchus, who recorded it as a star in 128BCE. Following this observations, centuries of astronomers noted the star-likequalities of the celestial being. Uranus took shape with the rest of the solar system around 4.5 billion yearsago. The seventh planet from the sun, Uranus is the third largest in the solarsystem – around 63 times the volume of Earth. To learn more about the uniquequalities of Uranus, check out this[https://www.askqotd.com/the-other-blue-planet/] askQOTD article.