Volans · Star Almanack

{% capture constellation_story %} Volans sounds like an incomplete name because it is one. The modern title keeps the word Flying from the older Piscis Volans, the Flying Fish. The missing noun is still supplied by the creature drawn in historical atlases. The constellation entered European celestial maps after the Dutch voyages of the late sixteenth century. Observations associated with Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman helped establish the southern figures that Plancius and Hondius put on their 1598 globe. Bayer’s *Uranometria* carried the flying fish into its influential atlas of 1603. Among the unfamiliar animals adopted by those maps, this one joined the sea and the air in a particularly vivid way. A fish leaving the water can seem like an invention fit for mythology. Flying fishes are real, and their motion is remarkable enough without a divine transformation. They propel themselves through the water and emerge into a glide, spreading enlarged fins to gain lift. They do not beat those fins like a bird’s wings. Some have enlarged pelvic fins as well as the large pectoral pair, giving them the appearance of four wings. The lower part of the tail can beat the water while the body is near the surface, helping the fish accelerate. The glide is an escape behavior, carrying it beyond the immediate reach of a pursuing aquatic predator. For someone aboard a ship, such an animal offers a brief and memorable crossing of the horizon. The fish appears in the air, skims forward and returns to its element. Placed on a celestial globe, it could remain suspended in that moment. Historical pictures often set the fish near the great ship Argo. That arrangement is visually apt, but the figure’s documented identity belongs to early modern mapping. It is not a forgotten animal from the ancient Argonauts’ equipment or crew. The stars of Volans are comparatively modest. Its field lies near Carina, whose brighter landmarks can help establish the region. The creature’s movement must come from the imagination rather than from a bright, unmistakable outline. Once its name is restored in full, the small constellation becomes easy to remember. It honors an animal capable of doing something that sounds impossible until it is observed carefully. The flying fish needs no miracle to deserve a place among the stars. ## Sources - [Volans - All Skies Encyclopaedia](https://ase.exopla.net/index.php/Volans) - [Constellation of Volans](https://www.davidmalin.com/fujii/source/Vol.html) - [A flyingfish, Cheilopogon sp. - The Australian Museum](https://australian.museum/learn/animals/fishes/a-flyingfish-cheilopogon-sp/) {% endcapture %}{{ constellation_story | markdownify }}