Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.66
K.S. Mahesh, K. Rupa, Padmaja Venugopal, S. Balachandra Rao
{"title":"A STUDY OF THE OCCULTATIONS OF <italic>ROHIṆĪ</italic> (ALDEBARAN) IN CLASSICAL INDIAN ASTRONOMY","authors":"K.S. Mahesh, K. Rupa, Padmaja Venugopal, S. Balachandra Rao","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.66","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.66","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135735969","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.65
Peter D. Usher, Enrico Massaro
: In 1573, Thomas Digges published a book entitled Alae seu Scalae Mathematicae and in 2023 we celebrate the 450th anniversary of its publication. The book was prompted by the apparition of the New Star of 1572, which Digges shows does not change position in the sky. He supplies its distances from some nearby stars in Cassiopeia, but the remainder of the book has long been under-valued. It presents a “new and unheard-of method” of ascertaining diurnal parallaxes of planets, yet Digges applies the theoretical developments only in illustrative examples. However, three years later in 1576 in an essay “A Perfit Description of the Caelestiall Orbes,” Digges makes the astounding claim that he has measured parallaxes of planets with sufficient accuracy to show that they do not circle the Earth at a constant distance but have some other center or centers. This paper examines Digges’ claim of an empirical disproof of geocentrism in the sixteenth century and its support for heliocentrism.
{"title":"THE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY EMPIRICAL DISPROOF OF PTOLEMAIC GEOCENTRISM","authors":"Peter D. Usher, Enrico Massaro","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.65","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.65","url":null,"abstract":": In 1573, Thomas Digges published a book entitled Alae seu Scalae Mathematicae and in 2023 we celebrate the 450th anniversary of its publication. The book was prompted by the apparition of the New Star of 1572, which Digges shows does not change position in the sky. He supplies its distances from some nearby stars in Cassiopeia, but the remainder of the book has long been under-valued. It presents a “new and unheard-of method” of ascertaining diurnal parallaxes of planets, yet Digges applies the theoretical developments only in illustrative examples. However, three years later in 1576 in an essay “A Perfit Description of the Caelestiall Orbes,” Digges makes the astounding claim that he has measured parallaxes of planets with sufficient accuracy to show that they do not circle the Earth at a constant distance but have some other center or centers. This paper examines Digges’ claim of an empirical disproof of geocentrism in the sixteenth century and its support for heliocentrism.","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135735964","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
: Astronomical orientation of ancient sites can reveal astronomical wisdom utilized to resonate with the context of the maker, thus providing additional insight into that ancient culture. In this study, the orientation of Phra That Doi Suthep Temple, a sacred Buddhist temple that was founded during the prosperous period of the ancient Lanna Kingdom (in Chiang Mai, in present-day Thailand), was investigated, as well as its connection to the tradition that many Buddhists walk up the mountain to the temple on the eve of Visakha Bucha Day ( Vesak Day—the Full Moon day of Vishākhā month). The remaining traces of historical evidence, including ethnic astronomical practices, suggest that the alignment of the temple when it was founded may have been related to the constellation now known as Corona Borealis (CrB), where α CrB is the reference star for the Vishākhā Nakṣhatra . To investigate this deduction, we surveyed the temple’s orientation using a theodolite and GPS, to obtain the azimuth of 59.74 ± 0.07° (30.26 ± 0.07° north of east). We employed Stellarium , which is precession-corrected, to determine the azimuth of α CrB and simulated that back in time to match that of the temple, thus yielding the estimated planning years. The finding suggests that the temple might be oriented to the true acronychal rising of α CrB in AD 1537 ± 19 in order to manifest the Full Moon on Visakha Bucha Day (a traditional Buddhist calendar’s New Year’s Day), close to the time when King Mueangketklao of Lanna reconstructed the temple on 21 April 1538.
{"title":"THE ASTRONOMICAL ORIENTATION OF THE THAI PHRA THAT DOI SUTHEP TEMPLE IN RELATION TO THE ACRONYCHAL RISING OF ΑLPHA CORONA BOREALIS AND <italic>VISAKHA BUCHA</italic> DAY","authors":"Orapin Riyaprao, Korakamon Sriboonrueang, Siramas Komonjinda, Cherdsak Saelee","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.68","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.68","url":null,"abstract":": Astronomical orientation of ancient sites can reveal astronomical wisdom utilized to resonate with the context of the maker, thus providing additional insight into that ancient culture. In this study, the orientation of Phra That Doi Suthep Temple, a sacred Buddhist temple that was founded during the prosperous period of the ancient Lanna Kingdom (in Chiang Mai, in present-day Thailand), was investigated, as well as its connection to the tradition that many Buddhists walk up the mountain to the temple on the eve of Visakha Bucha Day ( Vesak Day—the Full Moon day of Vishākhā month). The remaining traces of historical evidence, including ethnic astronomical practices, suggest that the alignment of the temple when it was founded may have been related to the constellation now known as Corona Borealis (CrB), where α CrB is the reference star for the Vishākhā Nakṣhatra . To investigate this deduction, we surveyed the temple’s orientation using a theodolite and GPS, to obtain the azimuth of 59.74 ± 0.07° (30.26 ± 0.07° north of east). We employed Stellarium , which is precession-corrected, to determine the azimuth of α CrB and simulated that back in time to match that of the temple, thus yielding the estimated planning years. The finding suggests that the temple might be oriented to the true acronychal rising of α CrB in AD 1537 ± 19 in order to manifest the Full Moon on Visakha Bucha Day (a traditional Buddhist calendar’s New Year’s Day), close to the time when King Mueangketklao of Lanna reconstructed the temple on 21 April 1538.","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135735962","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.75
Clifford Cunningham, William Sheehan
{"title":"<italic>The Moon in the Greek and Roman Imag-ination: Myth, Literature, Science and Philosophy</italic>, by Karen ní Mheallaigh.","authors":"Clifford Cunningham, William Sheehan","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.75","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.75","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135735966","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.70
I.S. Glass
: The first photographs taken at the Cape of Good Hope (and therefore South Africa) date from 1843 and were due to Charles Piazzi Smyth, Chief Assistant at the Royal Observatory, Cape. His surviving positives and negatives are gathered here with descriptions of their subjects. They are mainly of the Royal Observatory, Cape of Good Hope, of a Magnetic Observatory on the same site that no longer exists, and of various buildings in Cape Town. However, they also include the first photographic portraits made at the Cape and images of two astronomical instruments.
{"title":"THE FIRST PHOTOGRAPHS MADE AT THE CAPE OF GOOD HOPE","authors":"I.S. Glass","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.70","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.70","url":null,"abstract":": The first photographs taken at the Cape of Good Hope (and therefore South Africa) date from 1843 and were due to Charles Piazzi Smyth, Chief Assistant at the Royal Observatory, Cape. His surviving positives and negatives are gathered here with descriptions of their subjects. They are mainly of the Royal Observatory, Cape of Good Hope, of a Magnetic Observatory on the same site that no longer exists, and of various buildings in Cape Town. However, they also include the first photographic portraits made at the Cape and images of two astronomical instruments.","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135736355","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.67
R.C. Kapoor
: This paper is about a century-old 130-mm (5-inch) Zeiss refractor that is in the possession of the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in Darjeeling, India, and is on display in its Museum. The telescope is historical, being a gift from the German Chancellor Adolf Hitler to Maharaja Juddha Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana of Nepal in 1938. It turns out that this was not Adolf Hitler’s personal telescope as has been presumed by some, although he did have a similar 130-mm Zeiss telescope of his own. The Rana later passed his telescope on to his son Maharaja Bahadur Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, who presented it to the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in 1961.
{"title":"ON THE ZEISS TELESCOPE GIFTED BY ADOLF HITLER TO THE RANA OF NEPAL","authors":"R.C. Kapoor","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.67","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.67","url":null,"abstract":": This paper is about a century-old 130-mm (5-inch) Zeiss refractor that is in the possession of the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in Darjeeling, India, and is on display in its Museum. The telescope is historical, being a gift from the German Chancellor Adolf Hitler to Maharaja Juddha Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana of Nepal in 1938. It turns out that this was not Adolf Hitler’s personal telescope as has been presumed by some, although he did have a similar 130-mm Zeiss telescope of his own. The Rana later passed his telescope on to his son Maharaja Bahadur Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, who presented it to the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in 1961.","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135736622","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.71
Kenneth I. Kellermann
{"title":"<italic>The ALMA Telescope: The Story of a Science Mega-Project</italic>, by Paul A. Vanden Bout, Robert L. Dickman, and Adele L. Plunkett.","authors":"Kenneth I. Kellermann","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.71","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.71","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135735971","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.69
Aniket Sule, Shivam Joshi
: Indian Lunar Mansions, known as nakshatra , have been fundamental to Vedic calendrical systems. There have been some attempts to determine an epoch, when these asterisms were first defined, based on subjective interpretations of positions of cardinal points at the epoch of definition. However, these attempts have mostly had a limited scope of investigation. We attempt to address the question of epoch of definition using another approach. We assume that the choice of a particular principal star for each lunar mansion was the best possible choice for each corresponding ecliptic longitude zone and we employ precessional calculations to show for which periods in history this particular assumption holds true. Our analysis shows the period of designation of nakshatras to be around 2400 BCE. Visual analysis of sky plots around 2400 BCE further provides corroborating arguments in support of this date. The method is also useful in disambiguation of certain nakshatra definitions.
{"title":"CONSTRAINING THE PERIOD OF THE ORIGIN OF THE INDIAN LUNAR MANSIONS","authors":"Aniket Sule, Shivam Joshi","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.69","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.69","url":null,"abstract":": Indian Lunar Mansions, known as nakshatra , have been fundamental to Vedic calendrical systems. There have been some attempts to determine an epoch, when these asterisms were first defined, based on subjective interpretations of positions of cardinal points at the epoch of definition. However, these attempts have mostly had a limited scope of investigation. We attempt to address the question of epoch of definition using another approach. We assume that the choice of a particular principal star for each lunar mansion was the best possible choice for each corresponding ecliptic longitude zone and we employ precessional calculations to show for which periods in history this particular assumption holds true. Our analysis shows the period of designation of nakshatras to be around 2400 BCE. Visual analysis of sky plots around 2400 BCE further provides corroborating arguments in support of this date. The method is also useful in disambiguation of certain nakshatra definitions.","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135736354","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.74
Clifford Cunningham
{"title":"<italic>Star Territory: Printing the Universe in Nineteenth-Century America</italic>, by Gordon Fraser.","authors":"Clifford Cunningham","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.74","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.74","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135735965","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-01DOI: 10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.62
R.C. Kapoor
: There are innumerable records on stone and metal found in India detailing grants of land and donations made by kings and chieftains to Brahman priests, many on the occasions of eclipses and on the cardinal days. In this paper we investigate one such grant, first written about by Henry Colebrooke in 1809. It is from Gauj, the modern Gowthamapura in Shivamogga district in Karnataka state. Spread over three copper plates, the inscription is in mixed Sanskrit and Kannada and records a charitable grant of several villages made to thirty-two thousand Brahmans on the occasion of a sarpa yagna (snake-sacrifice) and a solar eclipse by Janaméjaya, the Puranic monarch who reigned over Hastinapur at the commencement of Kaliyuga. The eclipse was in the lunar month of Chaitra, on a Sunday, in Asvini naksatra. The grant further specified the circumstances such as Vyatipata ( pata – aspect), and that on the following day the naksatra was Bharani and the karana (the half-tithi ) was Kimstughna. These specifications make it the rarest of the rare eclipses. However, there is no eclipse mentioned in Janaméjaya legends, so was the eclipse in the grant genuine or an invented one? There were attempts made in the 1860s to identify the eclipse and possibly date the grant, but the identifications are not valid. In this paper we examine all such eclipses that occurred between 601 and 1699 CE and were visible from India. There are six such eclipses, in 712, 739, 851, 1027, 1372 and 1548 CE. Of these, we find the eclipse of 1027 CE as historically the most suitable one.
{"title":"FINDING KING JANAMÉJAYA’S ECLIPSE","authors":"R.C. Kapoor","doi":"10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.62","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3724/sp.j.1440-2807.2023.09.62","url":null,"abstract":": There are innumerable records on stone and metal found in India detailing grants of land and donations made by kings and chieftains to Brahman priests, many on the occasions of eclipses and on the cardinal days. In this paper we investigate one such grant, first written about by Henry Colebrooke in 1809. It is from Gauj, the modern Gowthamapura in Shivamogga district in Karnataka state. Spread over three copper plates, the inscription is in mixed Sanskrit and Kannada and records a charitable grant of several villages made to thirty-two thousand Brahmans on the occasion of a sarpa yagna (snake-sacrifice) and a solar eclipse by Janaméjaya, the Puranic monarch who reigned over Hastinapur at the commencement of Kaliyuga. The eclipse was in the lunar month of Chaitra, on a Sunday, in Asvini naksatra. The grant further specified the circumstances such as Vyatipata ( pata – aspect), and that on the following day the naksatra was Bharani and the karana (the half-tithi ) was Kimstughna. These specifications make it the rarest of the rare eclipses. However, there is no eclipse mentioned in Janaméjaya legends, so was the eclipse in the grant genuine or an invented one? There were attempts made in the 1860s to identify the eclipse and possibly date the grant, but the identifications are not valid. In this paper we examine all such eclipses that occurred between 601 and 1699 CE and were visible from India. There are six such eclipses, in 712, 739, 851, 1027, 1372 and 1548 CE. Of these, we find the eclipse of 1027 CE as historically the most suitable one.","PeriodicalId":42167,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135735967","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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