More awkward still, this gush from Aquarius' jar was meant to join our
constellation Eridanus below Piscis austrinus [n15 F. Boll, Sphaera
(1903), pp. 135-38.]. Says Manilius (1.438ff.):
Next swims the Southern Fish, which bears a Name
From the South-Wind, and spreads a feeble Flame.
To him the Flouds in spacious windings turn
One fountain flows from cold Aquarius' Urn;
And meets the other where they joyn their Streams
One Chanel keep, and mix the starry Beams.
Eratosthenes' Catasterisms bring one more complication into the picture, but
it is one which leads, finally, to the decisive insight. Differing from
those of Aratus (360f.) and from Ptolemy, it counts Canopus in the
constellation Eridanus, instead of Argo, and thus gives the river a
different direction [n16 See L. Ideler, Sternnamen (1809), p. 231; see
also E. Maass, Commentariorum in Aratum Reliquiae (1898), p. 259.]. The
whole "Gordian knot" of misapprehensions hinges upon the name Eridanus, and
one can do nothing better than to follow the good example set by Alexander
and "pull out the pole pin." Eridanus, lacking a decent Greek etymology,
finds a reasonable derivation from Eridu) as was proposed by Kugler, Eridu
being the seat of Enki-Ea, Sumerian mulNUNki = Canopus (alpha Carinae) [n17
B. L. van der Waerden, JNES 8 (1949), p. 13; see also P. F. Gossmann,
Planetarium Babylonicum (1950), 306; J. Schaumberger, 3. Erg. (1935),
pp. 334f.]. Eridu marked, and meant, the "confluence of the rivers," a topos
of highest importance, to which, beginning with Gilgamesh, the great
"heroes" go on a pilgrimage trying in vain to gain immortality--including
Moses according to the 18th Sura of the Koran. Instead of this unobtainable
boon, they gain "the measures," as will be seen. "Eridu" being known as the
"confluence of the rivers," Eridanus had to join, by definition so to speak,
some "river" somewhere in the South, or it had to flow straightaway into
Eridu-Canopus, as the Catasterisms claimed. There have been more drastic
"solutions" still.