Musca constellation is located in the southern sky, just to the south of Crux, the Southern Cross. Its name means “the fly” in Latin.
The constellation was created by the Dutch astronomer Petrus Plancius from the observations of Dutch navigators Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman in the late 16th century. It was first depicted in a celestial atlas in 1603, in Johann Bayer’s Uranometria.
Musca has several notable stars and deep sky objects, among them Nova Muscae 1991, the binary system with a black hole, the Spiral Planetary Nebula (NGC 5189), the Hourglass Nebula (MyCn 18), the globular clusters NGC 4833 and NGC 4372 and the Dark Doodad Nebula.
FACTS, LOCATION & MAP
Musca is the 77th constellation in size, occupying an area of 138 square degrees. It is located in the third quadrant of the southern hemisphere (SQ3) and can be seen at latitudes between +10° and -90°. The neighboring constellations are Apus, Carina, Centaurus, Chamaeleon, Circinus and Crux.
Musca belongs to the Johann Bayer family of constellations, along with Apus, Chamaeleon, Dorado, Grus, Hydrus, Indus, Pavo, Phoenix, Tucana and Volans.
Musca contains one star with known planets and has no Messier objects. The brightest star in the constellation is Alpha Muscae, with an apparent magnitude of 2.69. There are no meteor showers associated with the constellation.
STORY
Musca was one of the 12 constellations introduced by the Dutch navigators Keyser and de Houtman during their expeditions to the East Indies in the late 16th century. In de Houtman’s catalogue of 1603, the constellation is called De Vlieghe, which is Dutch for “the fly.”
The Dutch cartographer Petrus Plancius was the first to include the constellation on his globe of 1598, but left it unnamed. When Johann Bayer included it is his star atlas Uranometria, he called the constellation Apis, the Bee, and this name was widely used for about two centuries.
The constellation first appeared under the name Musca in 1602, on a globe by the Dutch cartographer Willem Janszoon Blaeu. Plancius did not use any names for the constellation until 1612, when he named it Muia on his globe, which is Greek for “the fly.”
For a while, the constellation was known as the Southern Fly, Musca Australis, as there was a constellation called Musca Borealis, the Northern Fly, at the time, located in the north of what is today Aries constellation. The French astronomer Nicolas Louis de Lacaille was the one who named the constellation Musca Australis. The name was later shortened to simply Musca.
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