The first asteroid ever discovered was Ceres, found on New Year's Day 1801 by Giuseppe Piazzi at the Palermo Observatory. At 583 miles in diameter, Ceres represents a milestone in astronomical history and the beginning of humanity's awareness of the asteroid belt. What Piazzi couldn't have known at the time was that he'd opened the door to understanding an entire population of objects orbiting between Mars and Jupiter, objects that would later prove central to theories about planetary formation, cosmic impacts, and the history of catastrophic events in our solar system. The discovery of Ceres marked the moment when science began to grasp the true complexity and danger of the cosmic environment Earth inhabits.