stars in this group represented ostriches, young and old, eggs, and egg-shells.
"The River Jordan," "the Red Sea," and "the River of the Judge" are other names for this famous stream, and it has been identified with Homer's stream flowing around the earth, and sometimes bore the titles "Oceanus," and "the River of Ocean."
β Eridani, called by the Arabs "Cursa," signifying a footstool, is the principal star in the constellation seen in these latitudes. It owes its name to its position close to the foot of the Giant Hunter Orion. The Chinese called this star "the Golden Well," and it was regarded by the Arabs as an ostrich nest, a number of which are scattered through the constellation.
The star γ Eridani was called by the Arabs "Zamack," meaning the "bright star of the boat." This would seem to infer that some sort of a craft was supposed to traverse the stream, and might be an allusion to the Ark, if the stream was originally intended to represent the Flood, as many authorities think.
We have, then, in the constellation Eridanus the diverse representations of a river on which there is a boat, and a gathering place for ostriches, with their nests, eggs, and egg-shells in evidence. This confusion of stellar imagery is one of the features of constellational study, and is at first blush difficult to account for. It seems reasonable to suppose, however, that the art of stellar representation was not confined to any one country, or a particular tribe, and as the nomadic herdsmen travelled from place to place, they left in each a smattering of the star lore that was as much a part of their lives as a knowledge of flocks and herds. As they would in all likelihood see in the star groups whatever their individual fancy dictated, a diversity of representations would naturally follow, which accounts in part for the confusion of figures that a close study of the constellations reveals.
Eridanus is an inconspicuous constellation, but on a
