Historic Boötes and Canes Venatici

I came into this inspiring blog focusing on medieval literature and arts. One of his entry talks about the historic representation of Bootes and how Canes Venatici came to be. It’s a short entry but very informative, but he only has Bootes. So I was thinking why not posting the entire constellation from its earliest representation to the most current representation in my blog. So in regards with the List of Figures entry of Bootes, let’s rewrite the entry here, and next, the rest of the constellation.

The earliest Bootes was probably a young herdsman holding a staff as depicted in Leiden Aratea (816 AD). Source: Leiden Aratea

 

In Limoges Aratea (early 11th century), Bootes was depicted holding the crooked staff in a manner as if he is driving something (Ursa Major) to walk. Source: Limoges Aratea

 

9th century Assyrian scholar Hunayn ibn Ishaq converted the crooked staff into “spearshaft with a hook” because he didn’t know the Greek word Κολλοροβος, and so he translated it into the nearest Arabic word, arriving at العصى ذات الكلاب , al ‘Ashadzat al Kullab, “spearshaft with a hook”. source: Kitab Suwar al Kawakib

 

In the first half of the 12th century, several decades after Alfonso VI conquered Toledo from the Moors, Italian scholar Gerard of Cremona found a copy of Almagest in one of the city’s former Islamic library and translated into Latin, bringing the text back to the Western Civilization. He mixed up the words kullab, “hook” into kilab, “dogs” and so the hastile haben canes, “spearshaft with dogs” was born. This dogs reappears in various star charts of the next era.

 

Johannes Regiomontanus in his Kalendarius (1512) has Bootes as a herdsman in his field, tilling about. He carries a spear, a sickle (“hooked”), a sword and other appliances that helped him in his pursue of the Ursa. Source: Kalendarius teütsch Maister Joannis Küngspergers

 

Petrus Apianus’ in his Horoscopion Apiani (1533) shows the Renaissance-dressed Bootes with an enormous club and companion dogs. Source: Horoscopion Apiani

Gerard Mercator didn’t show the dogs in his commercially successful Mercator Globes (1551). His depiction is close to the original Bootes, although he looks more like a soldier instead of herdsman. Source: The Mercator Globes

 

Zacharias Bornmann in his Astra (1596) shows Bootes with a spear, and naked. Source: Astra

 

Bayer in his Uranometria (1624) has Bootes with a spear shaft and a sickle. The stack of wheat(now Coma Berenices) provides a nice foreground.

     

Cor Caroli Regis Martyris first appear in Francis Lamb’s atlas (1673) to honor King Charles I of England. The name itself was probably introduced in 1660. Source: Les Constellations Disparues

   

Hevelius published Uranographia (1687), proposing Canes Venatici as the official constellation - dogs of Bootes. He decided the dogs to be greyhounds in Greeks: Asterion (“little star”) and Chara (“joy”). He also introduced Mons Maenalus, a mountain in Greece that Boötes is stepping upon. This time Bootes appears in his middle-age appearance, different with the younger original. His depiction of Bootes probably determines the modern shape of the figure. Source: Wikipedia 

Johann Bode’s Uranographia (1801) shows the Quadrans Muralis just above Bootes head(introduced by Lalande in 1795) and the Cor Caroli (introduced by Halley in 18th century). The sickle reappears and the crooked staff . Source: Uranographia

 

Alexander Jamieson’s A Celestial Atlas (1822) replaced the crooked staff with a spear. Source: Wikipedia

 

Urania’s Mirror (1825) added more star names into its predecessor image. Source: Wikipedia

 

Johan Meuris image for Stellarium (2005)

 

There is no official modern depiction of Bootes but in conclusion, most modern depiction of Bootes tries to incorporate everything that is there in the past. He carries many appliances of a herdsman: the crooked staff is now represented by the sickle, while his other arm, supposedly straight in line, is represented with a longer lance or staff. The dogs are depicted pursuing Ursa Major, but not hunting it. 

Source:

Check the hyperlinks.

Glarringkitteh’s Star People

Unfinished project by Glaringkitteh.

Andromeda	Aries
Ara	Aquila
Aquarius	Apus
Auriga	Antlia
Bootes	Camelopardalis
	Caelum

al-Sufi’s Book of Fixed Stars

 

 

The front page from Al-Sufi’s Kitab suwar al-kawakib, this one is a copy from year 1417

al-Sufi was a Persian astronomer who worked in Isfahan and Baghdad during the golden age of Islam. His most famous work is the Kitab suwar al-kawakib, “Book of the Constellations of the Fixed Stars” (986) which described the 48 constellations from Ptolemy’s Almagest.

The book was illustrated with observations and descriptions of the stars, their positions, their magnitudes and their color. For each constellation, he provided two drawings, one from the outside of a celestial globe, and the other from the inside. For each of the constellations, he provides the indigenous Arab names for their stars, drawings of the constellations, and a table of stars showing their locations and magnitude. The Kitab suwar al-kawakib initiated further work on astronomy in the Islamic worlds, and exercised a huge influence on the development of science in Europe. The work was frequently copied and translated. This copy, from the collections of the Library of Congress, was produced somewhere in south or central Asia, circa 1730, and is an exact copy of a manuscript, now lost, prepared for Ulug Beg of Samarkand (present-day Uzbekistan) in 1417.

Here are the 48 constellations from the copy of his book, sorted by page, which is basically from the north to south.

Ursa Minor The small bear with long tail.

Ursa Major The large bear with long tail.

Draco The dragon.

 

Auriga The charioteer.

Boötes The herdsman.

Hercules The club is replaced with a sickle.

 

Corona Borealis The tiara.	Lyra The lyre.

 

 

 

Cygnus The hen.

Cassiopeia  The seated woman, seating on a cushioned chair

Perseus  The hero, holding the severed head of a demon instead of Medusa

 

Cepheus The king.

Ophiuchus and Serpens The snake holder holding the large snake.

Sagitta The arrow. It looks similar with Coma Berenices.

 

 

 

Aquila The Falcon.

Delphinus The dolphin. Looks more like a cat or a fox.

Equuleus The little horse.

 

Pegasus The winged horse.

Andromeda Andromeda

Triangulum The Triangle

 

Aries The ram.

Taurus The bull.

Gemini The twins.

 

Cancer The crab.

Leo The lion. Here it is a female lion.

Virgo The virgin. Here the ear of corns has been replaced with wings.

 

Libra The scales.

Scorpio The scorpion. I thought since the Arabs live close to the desert, they supposed to have a good knowledge about scorpion anatomy, but no …

Sagittarius The archer. He wears a turban!

 

Capricorn The sea-goat. Weirdly, the fish tail is missing.

Aquarius The water pourer. depicted holding the water as if it is a robe

Pisces The fishes.

 

Cetus The sea monster.

Orion Instead of a shield, his west hand is shown with a long sleeve, characteristic of Muslim dresses at that time

Eridanus The river Eridanus.

 

Lepus The hare.

Canis Major The great dog. Those stars below are probably Columba.

Canis Minor The lesser dog.

 

Argo Navis  The ship.	Hydra The sea serpent.

 

Crater The cup.

Corvus The raven.

Centaurus and Lupus  The Centaurs and the Wolf. Instead of being impaled, Lupus is shown held by Centaurus

 

Ara The altar

Corona Australis The shell of a tortoise?

Piscis Austrinus The southern fish, with the prominent star Fam al-Hut (Fomalhaut) on its mouth.

 

Source:

http://muslimheritage.com/topics/default.cfm?TaxonomyTypeID=18&TaxonomySubTypeID=107&TaxonomyThirdLevelID=-1&ArticleID=833

http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/world/heavens.html

http://www.wdl.org/