The most famous long-period variable star, about which the Dutch amateur observer David Fabricius in Germany believed on August 13, 1596 that it was a new star, similar to the recent Tycho's star from 1572. In the then or older atlas, no star of magnitude 3 was drawn in the neck of the Whale. Only during its observation over the next year did he realize that it changes its brightness. As the first one, even before the invention of the telescope during Galileo's time, he discovered the first variable star in the history of astronomy! The star gradually disappeared and reappeared, until in 1603 the German astrocartographer Johann Bayer included it in his atlas as an object of magnitude 4. Later, in 1662, Jan Hevelius named it "Mira stella" - the wonderful star. The tip of the letter "V" formed by the stars from the constellation of Pisces points to it. Mira is located 300 light-years away.