Margaret, a moon of Uranus
8,913,553 miles
12 miles
Margaret is one of Uranus’s irregular moons and the only known prograde irregular satellite of the planet, meaning it orbits in the same direction that Uranus rotates, unlike most of its distant irregular companions. With a diameter of about 20 kilometres (12 miles), it is a small and faint object.
Margaret was discovered in 2003 by Scott S. Sheppard and colleagues, using the 8.2-metre Subaru Telescope at Mauna Kea Observatory, Hawaii. Its distant, inclined, and elongated orbit suggests that, like the other irregular moons, Margaret was captured by Uranus’s gravity rather than forming alongside the regular moons.
The reasons for Margaret’s unusual prograde motion remain a topic of study. Its orbital tilt is high enough that gravitational interactions over long timescales could significantly alter its path.
Margaret is named after a character in Shakespeare’s comedy Much Ado About Nothing, written in the late 16th century. In the play, she is a waiting gentlewoman to Hero, one of the main female characters. Margaret is tricked into taking part in a ruse that convinces Hero’s fiancé, Claudio, that Hero has been unfaithful. Although she is unaware of the scheme’s true intent, her involvement triggers much of the play’s dramatic tension.
The name follows Uranus’s tradition of taking characters from Shakespeare and Alexander Pope,
