Astronomy

This dialogue between a mother and her daughter offers a delightful introduction to the night sky. It contains 23 engraved plates drawn by Whitwell herself, including four hand-colored folding plates.

Greek writers compiled ancient stories of the constellations, often in poetic form, with memorable instructions for locating bright stars and zodiac constellations. Constellations of the zodiac contain the wandering courses of the planets and the annual path of the Sun.

Von Littrow, Director of the Vienna Observatory, adopted Bode’s constellation figures and star positions. In von Littrow’s atlas, the constellation figures appear faintly in the background.

Consider this geometrical drawing, portrayed with true perspective and a mastery of light and shadow. It comes from a treatise on art and mathematics by Luca Pacioli, yet it was not drawn by Pacioli.

Constellation figures remained popular in education, as in these constellation cards which make learning the constellations easy. The set includes 32 cards, each focused upon one or a few constellations.

This beautiful work by Sirigatti, published in 1596, brings the tradition of perspective drawing up to Galileo’s time. Sirigatti was a member of the Academy of Drawing (Accademia del Disegno), a school for artists and engineers where Galileo studied as a young man.

In the Prodromus, Hevelius explained the instruments and methods used to produce the star catalog. Hevelius’ Gdansk observatory, “Stellaburg,” was the best in Europe until the later national observatories of France and Britain.

The frontispiece depicts a variety of optical phenomena: Reflection. Refraction. Perspective. The rainbow. Burning mirrors.

Gilbert, physician to Queen Elisabeth I, attempted to map the world of the Moon with the unaided eye, even before the telescope of Galileo. In antiquity, Plutarch had surmised the existence of land and ocean regions in the dark and light patches of the lunar surface.

A “camera obscura” (“dark room”) consists of a box or container in which light enters via a small hole and projects an image on an opposite wall. The image will be reversed and upside-down, but its proportions will be preserved.

This beautiful atlas fused artistic beauty and scientific precision.

Featuring Galileo's Handwriting. When Galileo heard news of telescopes invented in the Netherlands he worked out the underlying geometry and crafted one of his own design. In this work, Galileo published the first observations of the heavens made with the telescope.

In contrast to the constellation figures in Hyginus and Abu Ma’shar, Piccolomini created a star atlas, measuring the positions of the stars according to an indicated scale (specific to each plate). He designated stars by Roman letters (a, b, c, etc.) in order of apparent brightness.

Kepler’s star map shows the constellations of Ophiuchus (the Serpent Handler), Sagittarius and Scorpius. The Milky Way runs diagonally down from the left, and the “ecliptic,” or annual path of the Sun, runs horizontally through Sagittarius and Scorpius.

Astronomers and artists alike studied the science of perspective. The title page of the Sidereus nuncius refers to the telescope as a little “perspective tube” (perspicilli).

Astronomers and artists alike studied the science of perspective. The title page of the Sidereus nuncius refers to the telescope as a little “perspective tube” (perspicilli).

Hooke’s Micrographia is the most remarkable visual treatise of 17th century microscopy. In describing the appearance of cork, Hooke coined the term “cell.” Hooke’s large fold-out plate of the flea is unforgettable.

For this first edition of Ptolemy’s collected works, Johann Honter drew constellation figures after the manner of Albrecht Dürer. The figures appear in contemporary dress rather than in a classical style.

In this work, Huygens resolved the enigma of Saturn’s changing telescopic appearance by proposing that a ring surrounds Saturn at an angle, varying in visibility from the Earth.

A sundial consists of a gnomon, which casts the Sun’s shadow, and a dial on which the shadow indicates the time. This simple portable sundial features a gnomon that can be adjusted according to one’s latitude. Sundials have ranged in size from pocket-dials to monumental architecture.

Capella described the seven liberal arts. The first three are grammar, logic or dialectic, and rhetoric. Then come the mathematical sciences, geometry and arithmetic. Geometrical circles in motion make astronomy. Numbers in motion make music.

This is a replica of an original polyhedral sundial created by Stefano Buonsignori in Florence in 1587, held in the Museo Galileo in Florence.

Six chief world systems were debated in Galileo’s world: • Ptolemaic: All planets revolve around the central Earth. Geocentric. • Platonic: Like the Ptolemaic, except switches the positions of Venus and Mercury. Geocentric. • Cappellan or Egyptian: Venus and Mercury revolve around the Sun.

Ptolemy (Claudius Ptolemaios) lived in Alexandria, Egypt, in the second century. Ptolemy’s technical work on astronomy, originally written in Greek, was titled Almagest (“The Greatest”) by its Arabic translators.

The great comet of 1680 illumines the sky above Nuremberg. One person among the onlooking crowd observes through a hand-held telescope. This was the first comet to be discovered by a telescope. Gottfried Kirch, a German astronomer, first saw it on November 14, 1680.

In his dialog entitled The Timaeus, Plato taught that the cosmos is constructed from regular geometrical figures known as the Pythagorean solids. Wherever one finds an emphasis upon mathematical demonstrations in science, one may credit Plato and the Pythagoreans.

In 1618, three comets appeared, visible to the unaided eye. These were the first comets to be observed with the telescope. Grassi was the leading astronomer in Rome and a professor at the Rome College (Collegio Romano).

Scheiner, a Jesuit astronomer, eventually published the definitive work of the 17th century on sunspots, in which he accepted Galileo’s argument that sunspots “move like ships” on the surface of the Sun.

Schreck helped Galileo show the telescope to the Medici family and others in Rome. Once he arrived in China, he wrote this work on engineering in Chinese.

In this book, Regiomontanus predicted the positions of the Sun and Moon for 40 years. He designed a sundial to work independently of one’s latitude, and a volvelle, or circular dial, to locate the position and phase of the Moon according to date and time.

In this introduction to astronomy and geography, the Moon lies embedded within a solid sphere carrying it around the Earth once a month. The solid sphere explains why the same side of the Moon always faces the Earth.

Aratus, a Greek scientist and poet of the 3rd century B.C.E., offered practical advice for predicting the weather by learning to recognize the seasonal appearances of constellations.

Gallucci, a Venetian scholar, was interested in astronomical instruments, both physical and on paper. The “Theater of the World” features a parade of rotating wheels, or “volvelles,” descendants of the astrolabe.

This Copernican cosmic section, the first published in Italy, appears in a sympathetic account, known to Tycho and to Kepler, which may have influenced Galileo. Naibod was a professor of mathematics at Padua who likely studied with Erasmus Reinhold in Wittenberg.

To provide entertainment at a dinner held by the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Galileo debated the Aristotelian physicist Lodovico delle Columbe on the topic of floating bodies. Galileo employed Archimedes’ mathematical analysis.

In this minor work, Kepler offered an analysis of comets that agreed with Grassi’s.

In this translation of Huygens’ Kosmotheoros, Huygens took up questions of the habitability of other planets and the existence of extraterrestrial life. These topics were also considered by Kepler, Wilkins and other popular writers.

In a work entitled “On the Universe,” Aristotle argued that a 5th element, called ether or the quintessence, composes the celestial spheres that naturally rotate in place above the region where the four lower elements mix together beneath the Moon.

Planetary and stellar influences affect one’s physical temperament, so one must take steps not to catch the melancholic “influenza” of Saturn: “There’s some ill planet reigns: I must be patient till the heavens look With an aspect more favorable” (A Winter's Tale).

This is Kepler’s famous pretzel diagram, where he focused attention on the planet rather than the rotating solid sphere which carried the planet. In an Earth-centered system, the planet must follow some kind of similar pretzel path as it is carried along within a thick solid sphere.

Bernardino Baldi was an Italian mathematician whose work gives insight into the milieu of Galileo. This is one of two autograph manuscripts by Baldi held by the Collections.

This manuscript contains two transcriptions of a university lecture by Erasmus Reinhold. The diagrams are nearly identical to Aristotle’s discussion of halos in the Meteorology. Reinhold was a well-known Wittenberg astronomer, sympathetic to Copernicus.

The tiny size of a volume by Coronelli belies its historical importance: in this Epitome, Coronelli explained how to use celestial and terrestrial globes, and his techniques for constructing them.

These 3 broadsides, issued approximately 2 weeks apart, contain the first detailed illustrations of Mars.

This book is Schall’s account of the Jesuit mission in China after Ricci. Working closely with Chinese collaborators, Schall oversaw the publication of more than 30 scientific works in Chinese which drew upon Galileo, Copernicus, Tycho, Kepler and John Napier.

In this book, Grassi responded to the criticism of Guiducci/Galileo. Comets seemed to provide a test of the Copernican and Tychonic systems: if the Earth were moving, then with three comets, one might have hoped to see at least one of them retrograding.

Edmond Halley, later of cometary fame, sailed to the South Pacific island of St. Helena. Over a period of 2 years, Halley recorded the positions of 341 southern stars in this table of the right ascensions and distances of the principal southern stars.

Ptolemy’s influential music theory was related to his astronomy. Through sight, we apprehend beauty through astronomy. Through hearing, we apprehend beauty through harmony.

In the New Astronomy (Astronomia nova 1609), Kepler demonstrated with respect to Mars what we now call his first two laws of planetary motion. In the preface to that work, translated here, Kepler answered objections to Copernicus based upon Scripture.

This commentary on Aristotle’s meteorology contains numerous contemporary annotations and drawings (not yet studied). D’Ailly was a theologian, mathematician, astronomer, and cosmographer who helped the medieval church heal the schism of three rival popes.

In 1840, Agassiz introduced a radical element of contingency into geohistory, contrary to then widespread assumptions of uninterrupted gradual cooling.

Back in Rome, Kircher collected all the information he could gather from Jesuits in China, publishing this massive encyclopedia on China, Tibet, India, Korea and Japan. It contains two notable early maps, numerous portraits, and an introduction to Sanskrit and Chinese characters.

A globe maker for the French royal family, J. Fortin, prepared this edition of Flamsteed’s celestial atlas in a much reduced format. Flamsteed was the first Astronomer Royal, who oversaw the building of the Greenwich Observatory. Newton relied upon Flamsteed’s star positions in his Principia.

In the Scandaglio, Galileo’s friends tried to refute Grassi’s Astronomical Balance. This obscure and mysterious work appeared under the name of the brother of the better-known Francesco Stelluti, one of the founders of the Academy of the Lynx and friend of Galileo and Prince Cesi.

In one of Kircher’s images is of Matteo Ricci is pictured on the left, along with Xu Guangki (??? 1562-1633) on the right.

In a work entitled “On the Universe,” Aristotle argued that a 5th element, called ether or the quintessence, composes the celestial spheres that naturally rotate in place above the region where the four lower elements mix together beneath the Moon.

In a work entitled “On the Universe,” Aristotle argued that a 5th element, called ether or the quintessence, composes the celestial spheres that naturally rotate in place above the region where the four lower elements mix together beneath the Moon.

Bode created a new constellation, Herschels Teleskop, near Auriga, to honor William Herschel’s discovery of Uranus in 1781. This Bode-Fortin-Flamsteed atlas is a 1782 German edition of Fortin’s 1776 reprinting of Flamsteed’s 1729 atlas.

For two decades, Tycho and his assistants at Uraniborg produced thousands of astronomical observations of unprecedented quality. Tycho’s large-scale observing instruments, together with sophisticated new error correction techniques, increased observational precision by a factor of twenty.

An armillary sphere is a spherical astrolabe, showing the great circles in their unflattened orientation: The great circle of the ecliptic (the path of the Sun) is marked off in degrees of celestial longitude and in the 12 signs of the Zodiac.

In a work entitled “On the Universe,” Aristotle argued that a 5th element, called ether or the quintessence, composes the celestial spheres that naturally rotate in place above the region where the four lower elements mix together beneath the Moon.

This work contains a survey of the constellations and a cosmological dialogue, Lo Spaccio de la Bestia Trionfante (The Expulsion of the Triumphant Beast, 1584). Bruno, a Dominican astrologer and philosopher, affirmed that the universe is infinite, having no center.

Why physicians studied astronomy: Zodiac Man diagrams like this one reveal the hidden correspondences between the organs of the body (the microcosm) and the influences of the stars and planets that affect them (the microcosm).

“Many a night I saw the Pleiades rising thro’ the mellow shade, glitter like a swarm of fire-flies Tangled in a silver braid.” “Locksley Hall,” 5th couplet.

Kepler’s major correspondence is gathered here in two rare volumes bound together. Bernegger, one of Kepler’s closest friends, also published Latin translations of Galileo’s Compass, Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina, and Dialogue on the Two Chief Systems of the World.

The astrolabe, one of the fundamental instruments for observational astronomy, consists of three major parts: the mater, the underlying disk; the climate, a removable disk adjusted for latitude; and the rete, a ring marked with star positions.

Although Galileo eloquently championed mathematical methods in science, the main target of his wit and sarcasm in The Assayer was Grassi, a fellow astronomer, whose mathematical methods proved that comets move above the Moon.

In De mundi aetherei (1588), Tycho reported that the comet of 1577 displayed no detectable parallax and thus moved, contrary to Aristotle, in the regions of the heavens beyond the Moon, passing through multiple celestial spheres. The ancient solid spheres melted.

This work was attributed to Proclus (5th century), one of the most important Neoplatonic philosophers of late antiquity. It became one of the most popular introductions to astronomy during the Italian Renaissance, appearing in more than 70 16th-century editions.

Danti was a cosmographer in the court of Cosimo I de Medici. Visitors to Florence today may view his stunning maps of the world in the Hall of Maps of the Palazzo Vecchio, as well as armillary spheres and a quadrant he mounted on the facade of the church of Santa Maria Novella.

Della Porta dedicated several books to Cesi. Cesi underwrote publication of this book on meteorology, which includes wide-ranging discussions of water, earthquakes and meteorites. The title page displays Cesi’s coat of arms.

In his second and last contribution to the “Controversy over the Comets,” Kepler stepped in as a “shield-bearer” to defend Tycho from Galileo’s attacks.

The “influenza” of Saturn brings melancholy: On one occasion, Galileo was called as an expert medical witness in a trial to testify about the physical effects of melancholy.

Astronomers use astrolabes for dozens of astronomical operations including telling time by the Sun or stars and determining the positions of planets.

With a telescope, Mayr observed the four satellites of Jupiter, accurately determining their periods of revolution. He named them Europa, Io, Ganymede and Callisto, names which are still used today. In this work Mayr also considered Tycho’s objection to Copernicus based upon star sizes.

In De revolutionibus, Copernicus placed the Sun in the center of the universe and set the Earth in annual motion around the Sun. This is the 3d edition, printed in 1617, the year after the Inquisition stimulated fresh interest in the work by placing it on the Index of Prohibited Books.

This sun-centered cosmic section representes the first published defense of Copernicus in England, printed in a work of meteorology.

After Clavius, Jesuits tended to adopt Tycho’s system. Biancani’s Sphaera replaced Clavius as the standard introduction to astronomy in many Jesuit colleges. Biancani favored Tycho’s system, which preserved the mathematical elegance of Copernicus and accommodated the absence of stellar parallax...

The Jesuit astronomers who had celebrated Galileo’s telescopic discoveries during his visit to Rome in 1611 now felt estranged by the biting satire of the The Assayer. The controversy concluded with this final reply. Both comets and cosmic systems remained enigmas.

Commentaries on Genesis often served as scientific treatises or encyclopedias. Mersenne, a French theologian, astronomer, music theorist and scientific correspondent, addressed a wide range of issues in cosmology in this commentary.

The cosmological system of Ursus is similar to that of Tycho Brahe. Both place the Earth in the center, and set the other planets revolving around the Sun. For Ursus, in contrast to Tycho, the Earth rotates around its axis once a day, allowing the sphere of stars to stand still.

In a comical ballad called “The Star-Splitter,” Robert Frost described a man outdoors splitting firewood after the first frost of autumn: “You know Orion always comes up sideways.

The frontispiece of Riccioli’s treatise depicts not two, but three major systems of the world. The Ptolemaic system rests discarded (lower right corner) because of the phases of Venus and Mercury (upper left corner). All-seeing Argus looks on, holding a telescope.

The illustrations in this cosmography show its indebtedness to the Sacrobosco tradition. Barozzi, a humanist scholar who lectured at the University of Padua, provided an updated introduction to observational astronomy, intended as a replacement for Sacrobosco and Peurbach.

An orrery, also called a planetarium, shows the choreography of planets as they dance with coordinated precision around the Sun. From antiquity, geocentric (Earth-centered) models of the moving planets were constructed, such as the Antikythera device and large mechanical clocks.

The frontispiece of Riccioli’s treatise depicts not two, but three major systems of the world. The Ptolemaic system rests discarded (lower right corner) because of the phases of Venus and Mercury (upper left corner). All-seeing Argus looks on, holding a telescope.

In Descartes’ cosmology, each star lies at the center of a “vortex,” or gigantic pool of circulating fluid. Stars and vortices are mortal, passing into and out of existence.

Ferguson’s books, orreries, clocks and mechanical devices were studied with interest by Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine and William Herschel, among others.

Newton believed that Solomon’s Temple encoded his inverse square law for universal gravitation. To Newton, his grandest achievement was merely a rediscovery of the treasures of ancient wisdom.

Algarotti’s popular introduction to Newtonian science went through many editions and aided in the dissemination of Newtonian ideas on the European continent. It was dedicated to Fontenelle. Like Fontenelle’s Plurality of Worlds, it was written as an entertaining dialogue.

Scientific theories may be accepted on the basis of a weighing of many complex factors rather than a single determinative observation or crucial experiment. From antiquity, Copernicanism had been rejected due to a failure to observe stellar parallax.

The Foucault pendulum swings in a constant plane or direction, and thus reveals the rotation of the Earth turning underneath.