Posted on 10/20/2022 11:58:34 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
Ok, they knew the earth was round so if they could find the equator they could do latitude, but how’d they do longitude?
Did you miss the part about the writer of the story?
‘Draco’ that old serpant,the Dragon.
.
The Gospel in the Stars is a
Fascinating read.
Wasn’t Aratus of Soli one of the Bond movies?
“Did you miss the part about the writer of the story?”
I didn’t see that that provided an answer to my question.
On the other hand, her twitter account says she’s a “Lactose intolerant Italian” and “a Jersey girl at heart” so that could substantiate the ESL thing.
I don’t care anymore anyway.
The later text is in Syriac (but you have to read through most of the Daily Mail article before they mention that).
Tycho Brahe made very accurate observations of stars and planets before the invention of the telescope.
Clearly she isn’t really a very good choice to write a story about a science topic.
No need to mark the equator for Latitude, the Pole star is a clear starting point.
Longitude can be based on any commonly known point agreed on by others. We just use Greenwich, England and Paris out of the common agreement of the English and Europeans.
That the world is round, as has been noted, was well established by the Greeks. The curious thing to some is that Columbus thought it was smaller, by a significant margin, than what the Greeks had measured. He was wrong, and only the unknown factor of the ‘New World’ kept him from being an unfortunate footnote in History.
(downloadable PDF)
New evidence for Hipparchus’ Star Catalogue revealed by multispectral imaging
Victor Gysembergh
https://www.academia.edu/88856446/New_evidence_for_Hipparchus_Star_Catalogue_revealed_by_multispectral_imaging
Columbus’ source for the circumference gave the wrong figure; also, Columbus did some due diligence, including a trip to Iceland, where he learned of the continental mass to the west that he concluded must be Asia.
[snip] Ptolemy reported the calculations of Posidonius instead of those of Eratosthenes, and it was Ptolemy’s writings that found their way to Christopher Columbus. If Ptolemy had used Eratosthenes’s larger, more accurate figure for Earth’s circumference, Columbus might never have sailed west. [/snip]
The researcher (paper linked at #29) merely pointed out the modern equivalents for Hipparchus’ info.
In this context they are not referring to longitude as a position on the earth’s surface, but rather the east/west position of a particular star relative to a reference point in the night sky.
10
This is interesting, sunkenciv.
I have so often used the term “parchment” to describe an old rugged paper with a crinkley texture to it.
Little did I know the original is made from animal hides. So the story becomes much clearer.
Same here. Actually, I didn’t really have a clear idea what parchment was for the first two, three, four decades of my life. :^)
[wikiwacky] Parchment is a writing material made from specially prepared untanned skins of animals—primarily sheep, calves, and goats. It has been used as a writing medium for over two millennia. Vellum is a finer quality parchment made from the skins of young animals such as lambs and young calves. [/wikiwacky]
My pleasure.
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