Ceres

The first of the "asteroids" to be found. Asteroid is a word created by William Herschel to mean "star like".
Later, changes in understanding what forms a planet or not meant that it was changed from simply an asteroid to a dwarf-planet, the only one inside Neptune's orbit.

Find out what other asteroids/minor planets/dwarf planets were found around the time Ceres was discovered.

Ceres was the first asteroid discovered, on 1 January 1801 by Giuseppe Piazzi at Palermo Astronomical Observatory in Sicily.
Ceres comprises nearly a third of the estimated mass of the asteroid belt.
Dawn observed 4,423 boulders larger than 344 ft in diameter.
In 2004 it was discovered that Ceres has a type of atmosphere that appears at times, something similar to the way comets form their tails.
The search for other planets was first started in the 16th century, when astronomers began to think there must be a planet between Jupiter and Mars.