Orion

American  

[uh-rahy-uhn] / əˈraɪ ən /

noun

• Orionis
  genitive

1. Classical Mythology. a giant hunter who pursued the Pleiades, was eventually slain by Artemis, and was then placed in the sky as a constellation.

2. Astronomy. the Hunter, a constellation lying on the celestial equator between Canis Major and Taurus, containing the bright stars Betelgeuse and Rigel.

3. Military. a land-based U.S. Navy patrol plane with four turboprop engines, used to detect, track, and destroy enemy submarines and armed with missiles, torpedoes, mines, and depth bombs.

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Orion ¹ British  

/ əˈraɪən /

noun

1. a conspicuous constellation near Canis Major containing two first magnitude stars (Betelgeuse and Rigel) and a distant bright emission nebula (the Orion Nebula ) associated with a system of giant molecular clouds and star formation

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Orion ² British  

/ əˈraɪən /

noun

1. Greek myth a Boeotian giant famed as a great hunter, who figures in several tales

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Orion Scientific  

/ ō-rī′ən /

1. A constellation in the equatorial region of the celestial sphere, near Taurus and Gemini. Orion (the Hunter) contains the bright stars Betelgeuse and Rigel.

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Orion Orionis

“I think it’s a question of how much time can the Fed buy itself. Can they credibly not raise rates in September through the year-end?” said Tim Holland, chief investment officer at Orion.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 3, 2026

"You start to see Orion in late autumn. Orion is a distinct constellation that you can see with the three stars... the belt of Orion."

From BBC ● Aug. 31, 2026

Arriving at the Orion Stage at 6:05, the “traveling all-star band” and “highly professional” group were unfathomably amazing.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 24, 2026

During the Artemis III demonstration mission, crews in space and teams on Earth will practice rendezvous and docking operations between the Orion spacecraft and commercially developed lunar landers.

From Science Daily ● Jul. 23, 2026

But as the jackalope charged like a bull, so did Orion.

From "The Way to Rio Luna" by Zoraida Cordova

The brightest of these four, Theta1 Orionis C, is hundreds of thousands of times more energetic than the sun.

From Scientific American ● Oct. 20, 2023

The system, GW Orionis, is located 1,200 light-years away in the constellation of Orion and comprises three stars and the “deformed, broken-apart disc” that surrounds them, according to the researchers.

From Fox News ● Sep. 23, 2020

The star, also called Alpha Orionis, has variable brightness, meaning that its brightness rises and falls regularly.

From Salon ● Dec. 24, 2019

In the constellation of Orion, for example, Betelgeuse is the brightest star, so it got the first letter in the Greek alphabet—alpha—and is known as Alpha Orionis.

From Textbooks ● Oct. 13, 2016

You as a Board did a very fine job of selecting the BuSci personnel for Project Theta Orionis.

From Masters of Space by Robert Lee Berry