Astronomy In Ancient Greece

Astronomy, the study of the universe, is said to be the oldest of the sciences. Ancient civilizations observed heavenly events such as the passage of days and nights and the phases of the moon. From ancient times until the Renaissance, astronomy was orientated on the most accurate description of motions of celestial bodies observed with the naked eye: stars, and mainly planets including the Sun and the Moon. One aspect of the sky which does not appear to change is the pattern of the stars. The first nomads may have used the stars for directions findings in their travels (Robert E. Krebs, 2004). For others, they’re important for religious reasons. The ancients group together some stars into constellations. Often, these were given names …show more content…
Rather than simply observing the heavens or providing mythical and mystical stories about events in the sky, the Greeks sought explanations in terms of mathematical models of the universe (V. Gaffney, 2013). For example, one of the previous explanations of a lunar eclipses was that the dragon was eating up the moon. But the Greeks recognized that it was the earth’s shadow cast on the moon when both were aligned with the sun. By noting the intervals, they were able to predict the time of eclipses and tell whether the Eclipses would be full or partial. The Greeks also taught explanations for the movement of the planets. Such achievements of astronomy in ancient Egypt as the introduction of a calendar employing a year having 365 days around 3000 BC and division of the night and, by analogy, the day into 12 parts, may be considered to be the most lasting (Edwin C. Krupp, 2003). Even Copernicus in Book 3 of his De revolutionibus commented on the usefulness of the Egyptian year: In computing the heavenly motions, however, I shall use Egyptian years everywhere. Among the civil [years], they alone are found to be uniform (translated by Edward …show more content…
Between the eighth and fourteenth centuries astronomy developed successfully in Islamic countries: in the Middle East, Northern Africa, and Moorish Spain. Two factors were the cause of that, geographical proximity of these countries to the global centres of ancient science, where academic texts could be found; and religious practices of Islam, which set upon astronomy many tasks concerning timekeeping (lunar calendar, the requirement of praying five times a day) and determining the direction towards Mecca in any place in the world (Nancy Hathaway, 2004). In the ninth century, most Greek scholarly treaties, including Ptolemy’s Almagest, had already been translated into