What are the vernacular names applied to the phases of the Moon?
ANSWER To reiterate: The Moon rises and sets in roughly the same places on the horizon as the Sun, but about 50 minutes later each night. Every 29-30 days there is a New Moon – we cannot see it because it is near the bright late afternoon Sun in the sky. A few days later we can see a thin Crescent Moon, with its limited light surface on its eastern flank, which appears high in the western sky soon after sunset. This first visible sliver of illuminated Moon (the boundary between light and dark is the terminator) was actually in the Celestial Sphere and was rising during the latter part of the day, but this could not been seen because of the blinding effect of daylight from the west. Each successive night, as its phase gets greater (called waxing), the Moon becomes seen further south along its transit arc and sets a bit later until about 14 days after the New Moon we see a Full Moon. The Sun and the Moon are on opposite sides of the Earth, and after the Sun sets, the Moon rises. A Full M
