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C/1898 L1 (Coddington–Pauly)

astronomical object

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 22, 2026
Entity authorityQ1022587 ↗
Source-derived summary

Comet Coddington–Pauly, formally designated as C/1898 L1, is a non-periodic comet that was visible through telescopes between 1898 and 1899. It is the second comet ever discovered through photography (after 206P/Barnard–Boattini), and the only comet discovered by astronomers Edwin Foster Coddington and Wolfgang Pauly, respectively.

Discovery and observations

Edwin Foster Coddington made a 2-hour exposure of the Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex on the night of 10 June 1898, however the plates weren't developed until two days later. There he found a "strong nebulous trail" only about 2–3 degrees north of the star Antares, where his colleague, William J. Hussey, confirmed it was a comet. It was later discovered independently by Romanian astronomer, Wolfgang Pauly, while observing the Messier 4 globular cluster on 14 June 1898.

Editorial summary

“C/1898 L1 (Coddington–Pauly)” enters the record as astronomical object. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Coddington, Pauly and astronomical can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1898, 1899—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Coddington, Pauly and astronomical.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“C/1898 L1 (Coddington–Pauly)” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Coddington, Pauly and astronomical provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1022587. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1898 and 1899.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  2. Expand the search: follow C/1898 L1 (Coddington–Pauly) primary sources, C/1898 L1 (Coddington–Pauly) archive and Coddington research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “C/1898 L1 (Coddington–Pauly)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.