in astronomy, a star of the first magnitude in the rudder of Argo, a constellation of the southern hemisphere. See ASTRONOMY, No. 266.

Pagan mythology, one of the deities of the ancient Egyptians, and, according to some, the god of water. It is said, that the Chaldeans, who worshipped fire, carried their fancied deity thro' other countries to try its power, in order that, if it obtained the victory over the other gods, it might be acknowledged as the true object of worship; and it having easily subdued the gods of wood, stone, brass, silver, and gold, its priests declared, that all gods did it homage. This the priests of Canopus hearing, and finding that the Chaldeans had brought their god to contend with Canopus, they took a large earthen vessel, in which they bored several holes, which they afterwards stoppered with wax, and having filled the vessel with water, painted it of several colours, and fitting the head of an idol to it, brought it out, in order to contend with the Chaldean deity. The Chaldeans accordingly kindled their fire all around it; but the heat having melted the wax, the water gushed out thro' the holes, and extinguished the fire; and thus Canopus conquered the god of the Chaldeans.

Cansbus, according to Strabo, had been Menelaus's pilot, and had a temple erected to him in a town called Canopus, near one of the mouths of the Nile. Dionysius mentions it:

καὶ τοῦτο ἐγένετο Ἀμυκλῶν καὶ Κανοποῦς. There stands Canopus' temple known to fame; The pilot who from fair Amycla came.

Vossius remarks, on this occasion, the vanity of the Greeks, who, as he conjectures, hearing of an Egyptian deity named Canopus, took from thence an opportunity of deifying the pilot of Menelaus who bore the same name, and giving out that the Egyptian god Canopus had been a Greek. F. Monfaucon gives several representations of this deity. One, in allusion to the victory abovementioned, throws out water on every side through little holes.