Obsolete Constellation Checklist

 

Alternate Constellation Observing Program Coordinator:

Brad Young
212 E. 16th St.
Tulsa OK USA 74119
(918) 629 9160
allenb_young@yahoo.com

This checklist is required for the Silver Level certification.

Information is plentiful on the internet regarding obsolete constellations.  A good staring point is Wikipedia.

Select 40 of these constellations and sketch them, providing the information required on the form provided or your own form, with the same info included:

Obsolete Constellation Meaning Source Completed
1 Battery of Volta Battery
2 Linum Piscium Line of Fishes
3 Testudo Tortoise
4 Deltaton Triangle
5 Triangulum Minus Small Triangle
6 Lilium Fleur de Lis
7 Psalterium Georgii George’s Harp
8 Sciurus Volans Flying Squirrel
9 Hippocampus Sea Horse
10 Sceptrum Brandenburgicum Scepter of Brandenburg
11 Capra and Haedi Goat and Kids
12 Limax Slug
13 Hirudo Leech
14 Custos Messium Harvester
15 Tartandus Reindeer
16 Uranoscopus Stargazing Fish
17 Cancer Minor Small Crab
18 Gallus Rooster
19 Officina Typographica Printshop
20 Lumbricus Earthworm
21 Asselli and Praesepe The Asses
22 Felis Felix the Cat
23 Lochium Funis Log Line
24 Jordanus River Jordan
25 Rosa Rose
26 Asterion and Chara Hunting Dogs
27 Bufo Toad
28 Aranea Spider
29 Mons Maenalus Mountain
30 Noctua Owl
31 Scarabaeus Rhinoceros Beetle
32 Quadrans Muralis Mural Quadrant
33 Sagitta Australis Southern Arrow
34 Cerberus Hound of Hell
35 Gryphites Shellfish
36 Patella Limpet
37 Ramus Pomifer Apple Tree Branch
38 Taurus Poniatovii Poniatowski’s Bull
39 Antinous Antinous
40 Pinna Marina Mussel
41 Anguilla Eel
42 Leo Palatinus Lion of Palatinus
43 Pomum Imperiale Leopold’s Orb
44 Dentalium Tooth Shell
45 Globus Aerostaticus Hot Air Balloon
46 Tigris Tigris River
47 Frederici Honores Frederick’s Honors
48 Manis Pangolin

All these obsolete constellations have sources in the public domain describing or mapping the stars included. They either consist of stars not included in the official constellations (termed the amorphous areas by the Greeks), or overlap them, but portray something else.

Be sure and include an attributed copy of your source for the groups you select to observe. An example is shown below.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Custos_Messium

Or, if you use a text description when images are not available:

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=n_ReAAAAcAAJ&pg=PT309#v=onepage&q&f=false

LIMAX, the naked Snail. A constellation offered to the astronomical world, and composed of certain conspicuous unformed stars near the foot of Orion, and under the Eridanus. It is a constellation of small extent, and contains only a few stars; …The conspicuous stars, of which the constellation Limax is composed, are nine…There is one at the extremity of the head, one at the hinder part of it near the out-line, and these are both large and bright ones. A little distant from these, near the opposite out-line, toward the hinder part of the head, are two small stars placed near one another, after these is a vacant space in the figure, till toward the lower part of the body, where there is in the outline a single large and conspicuous star; a little lower than this, and at the opposite out-line, stand three in a cluster together in the last, which is also a tolerably large and bright one, is at the tip of the tail

Note: if your geographical location inhibits the visibility of enough constellations (40) on this list to meet the requirements (e.g. Southern Hemisphere observer) please contact the coordinator.

 

Return to the main page for the Alternate Constellation Observing Program.

 

Alternate Constellation Observing Program Coordinator:

Brad Young
212 E. 16th St.
Tulsa OK USA 74119
(918) 629 9160
allenb_young@yahoo.com

 

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