小行星是太阳系里的小天体,它们大多分布在火星、木星轨道之间的小行星带中。第一颗小行星的发现缘于一个很偶然的机会。1801年的1月1日,意大利西西里岛天气晴朗,岛北部巴勒莫夫天文台台长皮亚齐正顶着寒风,抓紧时间为他所从事的编制星表的工作进行观测。突然,他在金牛星座发现 Asteroids are small bodies in the solar system. They are mostly distributed in the asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The discovery of the first asteroid was due to a chance. On January 1st, 1801, the weather in Sicily, Italy was clear. Piazzie, the director of the Palermo Observatory in the northern part of the island, was in the cold, and he was obliged to observe what he was doing to prepare the watch. Suddenly, he found in the Taurus constellation