Common dolphin keep in captivity. Common dolphin The common dolphin is the name given to two species of dolphin making up the genus Delphinus. Taxonomists and cetologists usually recognise two species — the short-beaked common dolphin, which retains the systematic name "Delphinus delphis", and the long-beaked common dolphin "D. capensis". Despite its name, the common dolphin is not the dolphin of popular imagination; that distinction belongs to the bottlenose dolphin (genus "Tursiops") due to its widespread use in marine parks and its appearance in the television series "Flipper". However, this dolphin was the most frequently represented in the art and literature of
Delphinus Pegasus the flying horse. Delphinus lacks stars above fourth (apparent) magnitude; its brightest star is of magnitude 3.8. The main asterism in Delphinus is Job's Coffin, nearly a 45°-apex lozenge diamond of the four brightest stars: Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and Delta Delphini. Delphinus is in a rich Milky Way star field. Alpha and Beta Delphini have 19th century names Sualocin and Rotanev, read backwards: Nicolaus Venator, the Latinized name of a Palermo Observatory director, Niccolò Cacciatore (d. 1841). Alpha Delphini is a blue-white hued main sequence star of magnitude 3.8, 241 light-years from Earth. Beta Delphini, called Rotanev. The gap