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Star Lore Quadrans Muralis The Mural Quadrant

Quadrans Muralis is a now obsolete constellation, created in 1795 by Jérôme Lalande. Between 1791 and 1801, French astronomer Jérôme Lefrançois de Lalande put together a star catalogue containing 47,390 stars. As part of it, he designed four new constellations.

In 1751, Lalande had cooperated with fellow French astronomer Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille in measurements of the Lunar Parallax (Lalande from Berlin, Germany and de Lacaille from the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa). During his time at the Table Mount, de Lacaille had designed fourteen new constellations in the southern hemisphere, thirteen of them being named after scientific instruments and artist's tools, symbolizing the Age of Enlightenment. These creations inspired Lalande to design a constellation of his own, also featuring a scientific instrument. The Mural Quadrant referred to the wall-mounted quadrant at the observatory of the École Militaire in Paris. It included the stars between β Boötis and η Ursae Majoris. As director of the observatory, Lanlande and his nephew Michel Lefrançois de Lalande had used that quadrant for astronomical observations.

Quadrant used by Lalande to measure the lunar parallax; Source: Wikipedia

The constellation was first shown under the French name Le Mural in the 1795 edition of the Atlas Céleste de Flamstéed, a reissue of John Flamsteed’s Atlas Coelestis by Jean Fortin. Fortin supported Lalande's creation, writing that it was "...in the tradition of Lacaille’s naming of southern constellations after items of scientific apparatus."

Le Mural in Atlas Céleste de Flamstéed Source: Ian Ridpath

Quadrans Muralis in Uranographia Source: Astronomy Facts

In 1801, it was - slightly reduced in size - published by Johann Elert Bode in Uranographia under the Latin name Quadrans Muralis. Of all of Lalande's creations, the Mural Quadrant was the one coming closest to a universal recognition. In 1825, an annual meteor shower whose apparent radiant lies in this constellation was named Quadrantids. The name of the meteor shower is still used today as the last remnant of the former constellation. In 1922, when the IAU did not include Lalande's creations in their list of 88 official constellations, the stars were "returned" to their oroginal constellations. Sources: Wikipedia, Ian Ridpath, SkyEye, John C. Barentine: The Lost Constellations, Richard Hinckley Allen

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