Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1680s, from Modern Latin Magellanicus, from Latinized name of Portuguese navigator Fernão de Magalhães (c.1470-1521), the first European to round the tip of South America. He described them c.1520, hence the name in Europe; but at least the larger of the two had been mentioned by Anghiera in 1515. In English they were earlier the Cape Clouds, because they became prominent as sailors neared the Cape of Good Hope; "but after Magellan became noted and fully described them they took and have retained his name." [Allen]\n\nCoompasinge abowte the poynt thereof, they myght see throughowte al the heaven about the same, certeyne shynynge whyte cloudes here and there amonge the starres, like unto theym whiche are scene in the tracte of heaven cauled Lactea via, that is the mylke whyte waye.
[Richard Eden, translation of "Decades of the New World," 1555]
Wikipedia
The Magellanic Clouds (or Nubeculae Magellani) are two irregular dwarf galaxies visible from the southern hemisphere; they are members of the Local Group and are orbiting the Milky Way galaxy. Because they both show signs of a bar structure, they are often reclassified as Magellanic spiral galaxies. The two galaxies are:
- Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), about 160,000 light-years away
- Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), about 200,000 light years away
Usage examples of "magellanic clouds".
His Cantos had mentioned some plot by the warring AI TechnoCore to steal Old Earth-to spirit it away to either the Hercules Cluster or the Magellanic Clouds, the Cantos were inconsistent-but that was fantasy.
In one direction, the Milky Way Galaxy was frozen in majestic splendor, set off like a whirlpool of jewels by her satellites, the Greater and Lesser Magellanic Clouds, and blemished only by the irregularity of Sagittarius, a dwarf spheroidal galaxy in collision with the Milky Way, directly opposite the galactic core from Earth, and thus unseen through most of human history.
The Magellanic Clouds' were, of course, moving steadily and with increasing velocity away from the home galaxy.
The advantage of the Magellanic Clouds is this: We can study the entire galaxies in greater detail than any others simply because they are closer.
Most of our own Galaxy is hidden from us by dust clouds so that we know the Magellanic Clouds, as galaxies, better than we know our own.
Old Earth was moved to the Magellanic Clouds, all right, but not by any element of the Core.
While I was zeroing in with M-31, Sam was doing the same with the Magellanic clouds, or what he thought were the Magellanic clouds.
I don't know how it should look, since I'd never seen the Magellanic Clouds.
Not far outside the Galaxy there are almost certainly planets, orbiting stars in the Magellanic Clouds and in the globular clusters that surround the Milky Way.
It does need a finalebut you can't beat the show I put on in the Magellanic Clouds with a piddling little fine.
Yes, there is no place for you nearer than the Magellanic Clouds if you wished independence.
It appears that the links to the Magellanic Clouds were more resilient.
The astronomy texts I had available did not clearly identify which of the Magellanic Clouds contain S-Doradus.