  We undertook a multisite photometric campaign for the Beta Cephei star Nu
Eridani. More than 600 hours of differential photoelectric uvyV photometry were
obtained with 11 telescopes during 148 clear nights. The frequency analysis of
our measurements shows that the variability of Nu Eri can be decomposed into 23
sinusoidal components, eight of which correspond to independent pulsation
frequencies between 5 - 8 c/d. Some of these are arranged in multiplets, which
suggests rotational m-mode splitting of nonradial pulsation modes as the cause.
If so, the rotation period of the star must be between 30 - 60 d. One of the
signals in the light curves of Nu Eri has a very low frequency of 0.432 c/d. It
can be a high-order combination frequency or, more likely, an independent
pulsation mode. In the latter case Nu Eri would be both a Beta Cephei star and
a slowly pulsating B (SPB) star. The photometric amplitudes of the individual
pulsation modes of Nu Eri appear to have increased by about 20 per cent over
the last 40 years. So do the amplitudes of the dominant combination frequencies
of the star. Among the latter, we only could identify sum frequencies with
certainty, not difference frequencies, which suggests that neither light-curve
distortion in its simplest form nor resonant mode coupling are their single
cause. One of our comparison stars, Mu Eridani, turned out to be variable with
a dominant time scale of 1.62 d. We believe that it is either an SPB star just
leaving its instability strip or that its variations are of rotational origin.
