Editing Very Large Telescope (section)

==== Mapuche names for the Unit Telescopes ====
[[File:Eso-paranal-16.jpg|thumb|left|The interior of ''Antu'' (UT1), meaning "sun" in the [[Mapuche]] language]]

It had long been ESO's intention to provide "real" names to the four VLT Unit Telescopes, to replace the original technical designations of UT1 to UT4. In March 1999, at the time of the Paranal inauguration, four meaningful names of objects in the sky in the [[Mapuche]] language were chosen. These indigenous people live mostly south of Santiago de Chile.

An essay contest was arranged in this connection among schoolchildren of the Chilean II Region of which [[Antofagasta]] is the capital to write about the implications of these names. It drew many entries dealing with the cultural heritage of ESO's host country.

The winning essay was submitted by 17-year-old Jorssy Albanez Castilla from Chuquicamata near the city of [[Calama, Chile|Calama]]. She received the prize, an amateur telescope, during the inauguration of the Paranal site.<ref>{{cite news |date=6 March 1999 |title=VLT Unit Telescopes Named at Paranal Inauguration |url=http://www.eso.org/public/news/eso9921/ |publisher=ESO | access-date=4 May 2011}}</ref>

{{anchor|Antu|Kueyen|Melipal|Yepun}}Unit Telescopes 1–4 are since known as ''Antu'' (Sun), ''Kueyen'' (Moon), ''Melipal'' ([[Southern Cross]]), and ''Yepun'' (Evening Star), respectively.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.eso.org/public/teles-instr/vlt/vlt-names.html |title=Names of VLT Unit Telescopes |access-date=4 May 2011}}</ref> Originally there was some confusion as to whether ''Yepun'' actually stands for the evening star Venus, because a Spanish-Mapuche dictionary from the 1940s wrongly translated ''Yepun'' as "Sirius".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.eso.org/public/teles-instr/vlt/yepun.html |title=On the Meaning of "YEPUN" |access-date=4 May 2011}}</ref>