Ilse is asteroid #249 and also known as A885 QA. Ilse’s orbit is characterized by a semi-major axis of 2.38 Astronomical Units, an eccentricity of 0.22, a period of revolution of 1 340 days, and an inclination of 9.6 degrees. Ilse was discovered by the German-American university teacher and astronomer Christian Heinrich Friedrich Peters at the Litchfield Observatory of the Hamilton College, Clinton, New York, USA.

Ilse primarily is the name of a river, which rises from Mount Brocken, after which the asteroid Brocken is named. Several hundred meters below the spring is another spring, which emanates mineral-rich water. This spring is called Princess Ilse. The German author Marie Luise Auguste Petersen traveled in 1851 to that area and it was the only travel, which she made in all of her life. She got inspired to write a fairy tale. So she wrote a fairy tale, which was named Prinzessin Ilse. Ein Märchen aus dem Harzgebirge (Prinzess Ilse: A Fairy Tale from the Harz Mountains) and published it in 1852 anonymously. The protagonist is a princess, whose name is Ilse (well, surprise). She loses her way and finds the entry to the fairy world, where she is welcome. Obviously a fairy tale in the core meaning of this expression. The asteroid Ilse is named after this protagonist.

I can’t figure out the meaning of the name Ilse. I knew it only as the diminutive of the given name Elisabeth. So the fairy tale is the only source for the meaning of this asteroid. Ilse hence should represent a very lucky person.