There were originally two such constellations, both introduced in 1789 by the
Hungarian-born astronomer Maximilian Hell, director of the Vienna Observatory,
in commemoration of William Herschel’s discovery of the planet Uranus. Hell first showed them on charts contained in
the Ephemerides astronomicae (a yearly almanac) for the year 1790 published by the Vienna Observatory in
1789. The two constellations flanked the area in which the new planet was
found. Tubus Hershelii Major, as Hell called it, represented Herschel’s 20-ft-long (6-m) telescope and lay between Gemini, Lynx, and Auriga. Tubus Hershelii Minor (again, Hell’s spelling), crammed awkwardly between Orion and the head of Taurus, represented
Herschel’s 7-ft (2-m) reflector. Judging by the inaccurate representations, though, Hell
had not seen either telescope.
Bode reduced the constellations to one in his Uranographia atlas of 1801 under the name Telescopium Herschelii, located where Hell had
placed Tubus Hershelii Major. Bode, having bought telescopes from Herschel,
knew what they looked like and he realistically depicted the 7-ft telescope
with which Herschel actually made the discovery of Uranus.
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Telescopium Herschelii, depicting the reflecting telescope with which William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus, on the Uranographia atlas of Johann Bode (1801).
© Ian Ridpath. All rights reserved
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