Introduced in 1688 by the German astronomer
Gottfried Kirch to honour the Brandenburg province of Prussia
in which he lived. Sceptrum Brandenburgicum lay near the foot
of Orion in a large bend in the river Eridanus. It first
appeared on a chart published by Kirch in the scientific
journal Acta Eruditorum in 1688 but was ignored for nearly a century
until Johann Bode, another German, revived it in 1782 in his
star atlas called Vorstellung der
Gestirne. In that atlas Bode showed
it as Der Brandenburgische Scepter, but he adopted
Kirch’s original Latin name for it, Sceptrum
Brandenburgicum, on his Uranographia
star atlas of 1801. Its stars are
now part of Eridanus.
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Sceptrum Brandenburgicum on Johann Bode’s Uranographia star atlas of 1801.
© Ian Ridpath. All rights reserved
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