No one in Egypt, and no one around the fertile crescent of Mesopotamia, had ever seen the Sun shine at night. The people could obtain a fair idea of time by the stars; but the remote heavenly bodies need careful observation and calculation if they are to give time truly. A man, wanting to know the approximate time of night,… (more…)
Tag Archives: egypt
The Babylonians used a single peg with three concentric circles
With a few sticks or pegs, the Egyptians could make their first simple observations. They selected a level area and drove one peg into the ground to mark the point of observation. The observer sitting at that point ordered his assistant to drive in another peg at the direction of the rising or setting Sun. This operation was repeated day… (more…)
The ecliptic is the path of the Sun
In the countries outside Egypt the equinoctial cult prevailed. An architect today will speak of “orienting” a church, by which he means strictly “making it face east”; and most Catholic and Episcopal churches try to be so oriented. But in Egypt the fight between the equinoxes and the solstices formed a great part of history, and in the end the… (more…)
Monotheism had a short life in the Valley of the Nile
When young Amenhotep succeeded to the throne, he tried to be tolerant. But Egypt was not ready for monotheism in the fourteenth century B. C., and hatred expressed against his god gradually turned the king into a religious fanatic. He ordered the star worship discontinued, and the star priests persecuted. Even his old teachers fell under his displeasure, and he… (more…)
The little “rings with wings”
If the Sun is bright and the temperature too low for comfortable outdoor observations, you can still give a splendid demonstration by casting the projection onto a piece of white cardboard set at right angles to the telescope in an otherwise darkened room. In such projections the only visible portion of the Sun is the disc, known to astronomers as… (more…)
- Important events in astronomical history
- 24 Hours is a Clumsy Mode of Expression
- 50 Years of Listening for Aliens
- A Slightly Inaccurate Calculation
- Astronomers in the Middle Ages
- Babylonian Astrology
- Big Clue to Stonehenge
- China UFO sparks rampant speculation
- Chinese Science and the Equinox
- Dissapearance of Water Clocks
- Early Studies in the Nature of lLight
- Greek Gods of the Sun
- Ingenuity and Scientific Care in Egyptian Construction
- Local Mean Time of the Observation and GMT
- Monotheism in the Valley of the Nile
- Moon Complicated Everything
- Noon and Sunset
- Polar Auroras or Dance of the Spirits
- Sand Glasses Vs. Water Clocks
- Seasonal Change from Summer to Winter
- Space and Galaxies
- Sun's Changing Declination
- The Astronomy in Babylonia
- The Belt Known as the Zodiac
- The Chinese Observed Sunspots in Ancient Tmes
- The Ecliptic is the Path of the Sun
- The End of Twilight
- The Evening and the Morning
- The First Great Division of Time
- The Little "Rings with Wings"
- The Moon Goddesses
- The Moon is Irregular
- The Moon is Linked with the Superstitions
- The Sight of Earthshine
- The Sun was Worshiped as a God
- The Time Has Come…
- The Wrath of Heaven
- Thousands flock to see asteroid pod in Japan
- Time Appears to Be Neglected
- Time Reckoning Methods in Rome
- Universe and Secrets
- We Have Babylon…
- What is the Sun Declination?
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