Constantza, with a net registered tonnage of 641,737. The Black Sea squadron of the Rumanian fleet is stationed here. Constantza is the Constantiana which was founded in honour of Constantia, sister of Constantine the Great (A.D. 274-337). It lies at the seaward end of the Great Wall of Trajan, and has evidently been surrounded by fortifications of its own. In spite of damage done by railway contractors (see Henry C. Barkley, _Between the Danube and the Black Sea_, 1876) there are considerable remains of ancient masonry--walls, pillars, &c. A number of inscriptions found in the town and its vicinity show that close by was Tomi, where the Roman poet Ovid (43 B.C.-A.D. 17) spent his last eight years in exile. A statue of Ovid stands in the main square of Constantza. In regard to the Constantza inscriptions in general, see Allard, _La Bulgarie orientale_ (Paris, 1866); Desjardins in _Ann. dell' istit. di corr. arch._ (1868); and a paper on Weickum's collection in _Sitzungsbericht_ of the Munich Academy (1875). CONSTELLATION (from the Lat. _constellatus_, studded with stars; _con_, with, and _stella_, a star), in astronomy, the name given to certain groupings of stars. The partition of the stellar expanse into areas characterized by specified stars can be traced back to a very remote antiquity. It is believed that the ultimate origin of the constellation figures and names is to be found in the corresponding systems in vogue among the primitive civilizations of the Euphrates valley--the Sumerians, Accadians and Babylonians; that these were carried westward into ancient Greece by the Phoenicians, and to the lands of Asia Minor by the Hittites, and that Hellenic culture in its turn introduced them into Arabia, Persia and India. From the earliest times the star-groups known as constellations, the smaller groups (parts of constellations) known as asterisms, and also individual stars, have received names connoting some meteorological phenomena, or symbolizing religious or mythological beliefs. At one time it was held that the constellation names and myths were of Greek origin; this view has now been disproved, and an examination of the Hellenic myths associated with the stars and star-groups in the light of the records revealed by the decipherment of Euphratean cuneiforms leads to the conclusion that in many, if not all, cases the Greek myth has a Euphratean parallel, and so renders it probable that the Greek constellation system and the cognate legends are primarily of Semitic or even pre-Semitic origin. The origin and development of the grouping of the stars into constellations is more a matter of archaeological than of astronomical interest. It demands a careful study of the myths and religious thought of primitive peoples; and the tracing of the names from one language to another belongs to comparative philology.