Contains:  Solar system body or event
Ptolemaeus Alphonsus Arzachel Albategnius and Hipparchus, Bruce Rohrlach

Ptolemaeus Alphonsus Arzachel Albategnius and Hipparchus

Acquisition type: Lucky imaging
Ptolemaeus Alphonsus Arzachel Albategnius and Hipparchus, Bruce Rohrlach

Ptolemaeus Alphonsus Arzachel Albategnius and Hipparchus

Acquisition type: Lucky imaging

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Description

Ptolemaeus, Alphonsus, Arzachel, Albategnius and Hipparchus - 5 large craters in the Central Lunar Highlands.

So many features in this field of view.

The floors of all 5 major craters are unique and show a range of lunar crater floor features - From Ptolemaeus with its single larger crater (Ammonius) and a multitude of tiny craterlets peppered across an otherwise smooth basalt-flooded crater floor with no central topographic feature, to Alphonsus with a prominent rille (Rimae Alphonsus) along its eatsern edge and deeply eroded ramparts, south to Arzachel with nice crater rim terraces, a central set of topographic hills, some later craters and another prominent rille (Rimae Arzachel) on the eastern side of the crater floor, then northeast to Albategnius with a central mountain peak topped by a tiny 1 mile wide craterlet, and the Klein crater that impacted the western crater wall of Albategnius, and then further northeast to Hipparchus, a degraded remnant of an ancient crater that has been subject to significant impact modification.

Two catena are present on the eastern and western sides of Ptolemaeus. The most striking is Catena Davy located west of Ptolemaeus, whilst a second catena with larger impacts lies off the eastern wall of Ptolemaeus and just west of Muller crater. Both of these features are likely the result of lunar gravity pulling apart poorly bound cometary or asteroidal bodies resulting in an alignment of impacts from an coming chain of fragments (remember comet Shoemaker-Levy 9).

In the basement rocks to these five largest impact craters lie a series of NNW-trending scours that relate to the early Imbrium impact to the north that formed the Mare Imbrium Basin.

Finally, I can't leave without drawing attention to the aesthetic Herschel with its circular inner crater wall structure.

A labelled version of this image is also posted here in Astrobin.

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Ptolemaeus Alphonsus Arzachel Albategnius and Hipparchus, Bruce Rohrlach