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Franz is a small
lunar impact crater identified during the Apollo mission in August 1971 and located along the eastern edge of the
Sinus Amoris, a bay that forms a northern extension to the
Mare Tranquillitatis. Its diameter is 25 km. It was named after German astronomer
Julius Heinrich Franz.
It lies to the southwest of the prominent crater
Macrobius. To the north is the smaller
Carmichael, and to the northwest is the diminutive
Theophrastus
Theophrastus (; ; c. 371 – c. 287 BC) was an ancient Greek Philosophy, philosopher and Natural history, naturalist. A native of Eresos in Lesbos, he was Aristotle's close colleague and successor as head of the Lyceum (classical), Lyceum, the ...
.
The rim of this crater has been eroded due to subsequent impacts, although it retains a generally circular form. The interior has been flooded, leaving only a narrow inner wall and a low surviving rim. This floor has the same
albedo as the surrounding terrain, and is not as dark as the
lunar mare surface to the north and west. Attached to the exterior of the eastern rim is Proclus E, a merged double-crater formation.
Proclus lies to the east across the
Palus Somni, or Marsh of Sleep.
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{{Craters on the Moon: C-F
Impact craters on the Moon