Geological Chronicle
Aristoteles is an 87.57-kilometer impact crater situated near the southern edge of Mare Frigoris and east of the Montes Alpes mountain range. To its immediate south lies the slightly smaller crater Eudoxus, forming a distinctive pair for telescope observers, with an arc of mountains between them bending west before joining the walls. The smaller crater Mitchell attaches directly to the eastern rim of Aristoteles, while the low, flooded feature Egede lies to the west. Italian astronomer Giovanni Ricciolli introduced the designation in 1651, and the International Astronomical Union officially named it in 1935 using the classical form of Aristotle's name.
On the lunar geologic timescale, Aristoteles is a crater of Eratosthenian age. Observers have noted that its crater wall is slightly distorted into a rounded hexagon shape, with wide and finely terraced inner walls. By lunar standards, the crater is characterised by an extremely high rockfall density. Its outer ramparts display a generally radial structure of hillocks extending through the extensive blanket of ejecta.
The crater floor is uneven and covered in hilly ripples. Aristoteles possesses small central peaks, though they are somewhat offset to the south. Spectra of the central peak fits an olivine-bearing noritic gabbro mineralogy originating from a depth of 8.7 to 13.8 kilometers. The interior floor appears to have been filled with a 1-kilometer-thick layer of material that partially buries these projections.