要了解北天的三角座，参见三角座。

1603年，拜尔在他的《恒星志》中包括了这个远南天的小星座。它的主要星在太阳的两个最近的邻居-半人马座α和半人马β星旁边形成了一个大致等边的三角形。

Triangulum Australe is a small constellation in the far Southern Celestial Hemisphere. Its name is Latin for "the southern triangle", which distinguishes it from Triangulum in the northern sky and is derived from the almost equilateral pattern of its three brightest stars. It was first depicted on a celestial globe as Triangulus Antarcticus by Petrus Plancius in 1589, and later with more accuracy and its current name by Johann Bayer in his 1603 Uranometria. The French explorer and astronomer Nicolas Louis de Lacaille charted and gave the brighter stars their Bayer designations in 1756.