Abstract
The close analogies between Rydberg states in rare‐gas atoms and excitons in rare‐gas solids are discussed. A quantum defect classification of exciton states is proposed and a new value of the “experimental” gap is found. A simple semi‐empirical theory is also established, whose only ingredients are the exciton effective mass equation and the free‐atom Rydberg quantum defects. The present theory compares extremely well to the observed spectra in solid neon for all the excitons, including the first.

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