<P> Orion's Belt or the Belt of Orion, also known as the Three Kings or Three Sisters, is an asterism in the constellation Orion . It consists of the three bright stars Alnitak, Alnilam and Mintaka . </P> <P> Looking for Orion's Belt in the night sky is the easiest way to locate Orion in the sky . The stars are more or less evenly spaced in a straight line, and so can be visualized as the belt of the hunter's clothing . They are best visible in the early night sky during the Northern Winter / Southern Summer, in particular the month of January at around 9: 00 pm . </P> <P> The names of the three stars come from Arabic; Alnilam (النظام) means "string of pearls" or is related to the word nilam ("sapphire"); with the spellings Alnihan and Alnitam, all three variants are evidently mistakes in transliteration or copy errors . Mintaka (منطقة) meanwhile has the same root as Alnitak (النطاق), and both mean "belt". </P>

What are those 3 stars in a line