Star Trek Maps - 1980 science question

[Timo]

I don't actually have Maps, merely copies of the booklet. The XYZ coordinates given there do appear to correspond to the positions of the stars on the Maps, though - that is, they are clearly given wrt Earth's equatorial plane and still claimed to be wrt the galactic plane, placing Antares and Deneb on the wrong sides of Earth and so forth.

The Gamma Equulei thing I don't really know about. However, the Taugan Sector was mentioned in "Gambit II" as lying close to the old Debrune territory, and it might be that Mandel felt the need to associate this with Taugus at the cost of having to move the star. It's something he added to the map after I'd made the semi-arbitrary choices on where the RNZ should be and, thus, where the Debrune ruins should lie.

There are other such additions that IMHO push round pegs into square holes, such as interpreting Iccobar as a star/culture rather than merely a language. But Taugus is probably the only case where a real star suffered from such forcing.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Christopher]

I don't actually have Maps, merely copies of the booklet. The XYZ coordinates given there do appear to correspond to the positions of the stars on the Maps, though - that is, they are clearly given wrt Earth's equatorial plane and still claimed to be wrt the galactic plane, placing Antares and Deneb on the wrong sides of Earth and so forth.

They're not on the wrong sides, they're just described in a coordinate system that's inverted from our assumptions, i.e. it treats Terrestrial south as galactic north. It's all relative.

 

[DEWLine]

True enough.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I don't actually have Maps, merely copies of the booklet. The XYZ coordinates given there do appear to correspond to the positions of the stars on the Maps, though - that is, they are clearly given wrt Earth's equatorial plane and still claimed to be wrt the galactic plane, placing Antares and Deneb on the wrong sides of Earth and so forth.

They're not on the wrong sides, they're just described in a coordinate system that's inverted from our assumptions, i.e. it treats Terrestrial south as galactic north. It's all relative.

Everywhere...like such as...the galaxy...The B'Oraq...Maps.

 

[foravalon]

The Gamma Equulei thing I don't really know about. However, the Taugan Sector was mentioned in "Gambit II" as lying close to the old Debrune territory, and it might be that Mandel felt the need to associate this with Taugus at the cost of having to move the star. It's something he added to the map after I'd made the semi-arbitrary choices on where the RNZ should be and, thus, where the Debrune ruins should lie.

There are other such additions that IMHO push round pegs into square holes, such as interpreting Iccobar as a star/culture rather than merely a language. But Taugus is probably the only case where a real star suffered from such forcing.

Timo Saloniemi

I think the placement of Taugus is groovy, but I wonder why he made a connection between Taugus and Gamma Equulei in the first place, was there some pre-existing association?

 

[DEWLine]

I don't recall ever hearing or reading of such...?

 

[Timo]

Ah, right; seems that all the online references to a connection between Taugus and Gamma Equulei are Trek-related, something I didn't realize at first. But Mandel put a lot of information from old novels and TAS and other non-kosher sources into the Maps. I wonder if one of those made the connection?

It doesn't seem that "Taugus" would be a common (scifi) name in general, really. It's just a river in Portugal or something. Even if it was used in some old book, its use in "Gambit" was probably unrelated to that old material...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Christopher]

In point of fact, the reference in "Gambit" was to the "Taugan system," which could just as easily be the system of a star named Taugan, Tauga, or Taug as of a star named Taugus. So strictly speaking, there has been no "Taugus" established outside of Star Charts and the literature.