Bashō is a

crater A crater is a landform consisting of a hole or depression (geology), depression on a planetary surface, usually caused either by an object hitting the surface, or by geological activity on the planet. A crater has classically been described ...

on Mercury named after

Matsuo Bashō ; born , later known as was the most famous Japanese poet of the Edo period. During his lifetime, Bashō was recognized for his works in the collaborative '' haikai no renga'' form; today, after centuries of commentary, he is recognized as th ...

, a 17th-century Japanese writer. Bashō crater is only in diameter, but is a prominent feature on Mercury's surface, due to its bright rays. Photographs from NASA's ''

Mariner 10 ''Mariner 10'' was an American Robotic spacecraft, robotic space probe launched by NASA on 3 November 1973, to fly by the planets Mercury (planet), Mercury and Venus. It was the first spacecraft to perform flybys of multiple planets. ''Marin ...

'' and ''

MESSENGER Messenger, Messengers, The Messenger or The Messengers may refer to: People * Courier, a person or company that delivers messages, packages, or mail * Messenger (surname) * Bicycle messenger, a bicyclist who transports packages through cities * M ...

'' spacecraft show a curious halo of dark material around the crater. The dark material is typically referred to as low-reflectance material (LRM) and there is evidence that it is caused by

graphite Graphite () is a Crystallinity, crystalline allotrope (form) of the element carbon. It consists of many stacked Layered materials, layers of graphene, typically in excess of hundreds of layers. Graphite occurs naturally and is the most stable ...

. Bashō is one of the largest craters of the Kuiperian system on Mercury. The largest is Bartók crater.Denevi, B. W., Ernst, C. M., Prockter, L. M., and Robinson, M. S., 2018. The Geologic History of Mercury. In ''Mercury: The View After

'' edited by Sean C. Solomon, Larry R. Nittler, and Brian J. Anderson. Cambridge Planetary Science. Chapter 6, Table 6.4. Basho crater 0167015.jpg,

image Basho crater EN0108830184M.jpg, Image from MESSENGER's first flyby in January 2008 Bashō crater EN0260649832M.jpg, MESSENGER image Tolstoj crater and Basho crater MESSENGER WAC IGF to RGB.jpg, Exaggerated color image by MESSENGER, with Tolstoj at top and Bashō in lower left Bashō crater MESSENGER WAC IGF to RGB.jpg, Similar image centered on Bashō Bashō crater EN0249337919M.jpg, Oblique view from MESSENGER

References

Impact craters on Mercury {{Mercury-crater-stub