472 Roma is an asteroid

Asteroid

Asteroids are a class of small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun. They have also been called planetoids, especially the larger ones...

. It was discovered by Luigi Carnera

Luigi Carnera

Luigi Carnera was an Italian astronomer.In his early career he worked as Max Wolf's assistant at Heidelberg, Germany and discovered a number of asteroids...

 on July 11, 1901. Its provisional name was 1901 GP. This asteroid was named by Antonio Abetti

Antonio Abetti

Antonio Abetti was an Italian astronomer.Born in San Pietro di Gorizia , he earned a degree in mathematics and engineering at the University of Padua. Later he became director of the Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri and a professor at the University of Florence...

 for the city of Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

 in Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, the
native country of its discoverer.

At 21:57 UT, on Thursday, July 8, 2010, this 50 km wide asteroid occulted the star Delta Ophiuchi

Delta Ophiuchi

Delta Ophiuchi is a star in the constellation Ophiuchus. It has the traditional name Yed Prior ....

in an event lasting about five seconds. The occultation path crossed central Europe along a band that ran through Stockholm, Copenhagen, Bremen, Nantes and Bilbao. This was the only asteroid occultation event visible to the naked eye during the 21st century.