Download Thinking Outside the Sphere

Thinking Outside the Sphere
Views of the Stars from Aristotle to Herschel
Thinking Outside the Sphere
A Constellation of Rare Books
from the History of Science Collection
The exhibition was made possible by generous support from
Mr. & Mrs. James B. Hebenstreit and Mrs. Lathrop M. Gates.
CATALOG OF THE EXHIBITION
Linda Hall Library
Linda Hall Library
of Science, Engineering and Technology
Cynthia J. Rogers, Curator
5109 Cherry Street Kansas City MO 64110
1
Thinking Outside the Sphere is held in copyright by the Linda Hall
Library, 2010, and any reproduction of text or images requires
permission.
The exhibition opened at the Linda Hall Library April 22 and closed
September 18, 2010.
The Linda Hall Library is an independently funded library devoted to
science, engineering and technology which is used extensively by
companies, academic institutions and individuals throughout the world.
The Library was established by
the wills of Herbert and Linda
Hall and opened in 1946.
It is located on a 14 acre arboretum in Kansas City, Missouri, the site of
the former home of Herbert and Linda Hall.
Sources of images on preliminary pages:
Page 1, cover left: Peter Apian. Cosmographia, 1550.
We invite you to visit the Library or our website at www.lindahlll.org.
Page 1, right: Camille Flammarion. L'atmosphère météorologie populaire, 1888.
Page 3, Table of contents: Leonhard Euler. Theoria motuum planetarum et
cometarum, 1744.
2
Table of Contents
Introduction
Section1 The Ancient Universe
Section2 The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Section3 The Sun Takes Center Stage
Section4 The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Section5 The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
Section6 Motive Forces and the Stars
Section7 Plurality of Worlds
Section8 Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Section9 From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Section10 The First Map of the Galaxy
Multiple Galaxies Confirmed: Coda
Bibliography of Works Exhibited
References from Secondary Sources
List of Secondary Works Cited
About the Exhibit
THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE COLLECTION is the Library's special collection of rare
books on science, engineering, and technology. It includes printed books from the
fifteenth century to the present. Additional materials to support historical
research are available in the Library's general collections of over one million
volumes.
3
Introduction:
From a Crystalline Sphere to a Plurality of
Worlds
Renaissance works of astronomy beautifully illustrate the
stars fixed in a crystalline sphere at the perimeter of an
earth-centered universe that had been conceived in
ancient times. This sphere of the fixed stars was thought
to rotate, setting the lower spheres of the planets in
motion in their orbits around the unmoving earth.
Nicolaus Copernicus stopped the motion of the stars but
preserved them in their sphere. When a comet passed
through the supposed solid spheres of the planets in
1577 and proved them to be nonexistent, astronomers
rejected the concept of an orb of the stars as well,
allowing them to be dispersed.
Andreas Cellarius. Harmonia macrocosmica, 1661.
To view images at high resolution, go to http://lhldigital.lindahall.org/
Place cursor over “Collections” and select History of Cosmology .
In 1644, René Descartes placed our sun among the stars
and appointed them with their own satellites, heralding a
dramatic change in our perception of the universe. In the
eighteenth century, the sun and other stars were
perceived as comprising a star system, resulting in the
first map of the galaxy in 1785.
Table of Contents
4
Section 1: The Ancient Universe
Section 1:
The Ancient Universe
Ancient philosophers set the stage for the role that the
stars would play until the seventeenth century. Plato's
Timaeus established the sphere of the stars and its
circular movement. He described the sphere's dominion
over the motion of the planets and sketched in broad
strokes the size, speed, and direction of their orbits
within it.
Aristotle provided the physical foundations for the
motions of the planets, defining the number of spheres
required to account for their observed motions. He
established the necessity of the role of the fixed stars in
moving the planets in their orbits.
Johannes Blaeu. Atlas maior, siue, Cosmographia Blauiana, 1662 (v.1, intro).
Epicycles were fully integrated into this earth-centered
system by Ptolemy in part to account for retrograde
motion. He refined the model into an effective and
accurate tool for predicting the motions of the planets.
Table of Contents
5
Section 1: The Ancient Universe
Plato (427-347 BCE).
Timaeus. Paris: Badius Ascencius, 1520.
Plato's cosmological work, Timaeus, introduced the concept of
the sphere of the stars. The whole sphere was “a true cosmos
or glorious world spangled…all over” with the stars. The starry
sphere controlled the motion of the planets contained within it.
In his Republic, this idea was part of a tale of a soldier, slain in
battle, who returned to life while on his funeral pyre and told of
what his soul had seen during a journey that seemed to last a
thousand years. This hero, named Er, had traveled to a column
of light, like a spindle, that extended up into the sky. The
universe fitted onto it like a whorl of nested hemispheres.
“There is one large hollow whorl which is quite scooped out,
and into this is fitted another lesser one, and…others, making
eight in all, like vessels which fit into one another. The largest
is spangled...” and the others carried the planets.
BibrefsPlato1520
6
Section 1: The Ancient Universe
Aristotle (384-322 BCE).
Opera. Venice: Aldus Manutius, 1495.
This volume, open to the first page of Aristotle’s On the
Heavens, is one of a set of five that comprise the first
publication of Aristotle’s works in their original Greek. Aristotle,
a student of Plato, lent his genius to a comprehensive
treatment of cosmology that matched his brilliant investigations
into the rest of the natural world. In the process, he established
the necessity of the spherical shape of the universe.
BibrefsAristotle1495
7
Section 1: The Ancient Universe
Aristotle. (384-322 BCE).
Aristotelis Stagiritae De coelo… Cum Averrois ... variis in
eosdem commentariis.
Venice: Iuntas, 1550.
This commentary on Aristotle’s De Caelo (On the Heavens) was
written by the twelfth century philosopher Averroes. Aristotle
assigned the motion of the sphere of the stars to God as the
final cause. This heavenly source of rotation was associated
with its shape. “The perfect is naturally prior to the imperfect,
and the circle is a perfect thing.....it follows that the body which
revolves with a circular movement must be spherical... The
bodies below the sphere of the planets are contiguous with the
sphere above them. The sphere then will be spherical
throughout.”
BibrefsAristotle1550
8
Section 1: The Ancient Universe
Regiomontanus (1436-1476)
Epytoma in Almagestu Ptolemei.
Venice: Landoia, 1496.
The second century astronomer, Claudius Ptolemy,
revolutionized astronomy by transforming the concentric
spheres model into a highly effective tool for predicting the
motions of the planets. His epic mathematical achievement
was simply called the Almagest, or “great work.” This fifteenth
century epitome of his book is one of the most highly regarded
distillations of Ptolemy’s Almagest ever printed. An
accomplished astronomer and a master of the Greek language,
Regiomontanus took over the project from Georg von
Peurbach, who had completed the first six (of thirteen) chapters
before his death. Although Regiomontanus completed it in
1462, it was not printed until after Regiomontanus had also
died. In this image, the author and Ptolemy sit together below
a model of the geocentric system, with the starry vault above.
Although the two astronomers were separated by a dozen
centuries, the view of the cosmos had changed but little.
BibrefsRegiomontanus1495
9
Section 1: The Ancient Universe
Ptolemy (100-170 CE)
Almagestum. Venice: Petrus Liechtenstein, 1515.
Ptolemy made precise observations of the stars, and recorded
them in his star catalog. It is printed for the first time in this
edition of his Almagest.
On this page, the decorated initial letter “B” shows one
astronomer making observations while the another records
them. The sphere of the fixed stars was at the perimeter of
Ptolemy’s astronomical system, but the orbits of the planets in
his system no longer reflected its symmetry. Ptolemy diverged
from Aristotle’s ideal system by introducing the idea that the
earth was not the precise center of the orbits of the planets.
This insistence upon representing the true motion of the
celestial bodies made them seem more real and less divine. For
this he was criticized by some philosophers.
BibrefsPtolemy1515
10
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Section 2:
The Enduring
Earth-Centered System
In the Renaissance few ancient ideas were more
esteemed than the spherical form that was ascribed
to the starry realm. The heavenly vault was
celebrated in words and engravings. Many earthcentered works of astronomy were published long
after Copernicus suggested placing the sun in the
center of the universe in 1543. In this 1617 work by
Robert Fludd, Astronomia is shown chained to the
power of the Deity, conferring the astrological
influences of the celestial bodies onto the earth,
where they affect human activities. Astronomia’s
crown, intersecting the eighth sphere, relays the
motion of the stars to the planets, setting the
Ptolemaic universe in motion. For this author and
many others, the heavenly spheres of the planets
continued to move by the guided influence of the
outermost sphere of the fixed stars.
Robert Fludd. Utriusque cosmi maioris, 1617.
Table of Contents
11
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Peurbach, Georg von.
Theoricae novae planetarum.
Basel: Henric petrina, 1573.
Building on the work of Apollonius of Perga and particularly of
Hipparchus, Ptolemy developed an intricate system to account
for the retrograde motion of the planets. In his scheme, each
planet was attached to a small circle, called an epicycle, which
moved it in a small orbit. The epicycle was attached in turn to a
larger circle, or deferent, which moved around the earth. By
adjusting the size and speed of these orbits, Ptolemy was able
to make his system match the observed motions of the planets.
Peurbach gave the theoretical epicyclic system of Ptolemy a
more physical presence, making the cosmos seem more
tangible. Images of three-dimensional models, such as this one
of the orbit of Mercury, emphasized the solid nature of the
spheres, as did the text, which described an epicycle as being
“immersed in the depth” of its orb, and referred to “the cavity
in which the epicycle is situated.” This work was completed by
1454 and was first published in 1472.
BibrefsPeurbach1573
12
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Sacrobosco, Johannes.
De sphaera. Venice: Ratdolt, 1482.
This popular astronomy textbook by a thirteenth century author
was produced in numerous versions and iterations. In this
edition of the book, the printer Erhard Ratdolt includes another
work, by Georg von Peurbach, entitled Theoricae novae
planetarum (New theory of the planets), with handcolored
illustrations of Peurbach’s work. This one shows the sun in
yellow, moving in its epicycle around the earth. The work
includes a ten page section “On the motion of the eighth
sphere,” or the sphere of the fixed stars.
BibrefsSacrobosco1482
13
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Schreckenfuchs, Erasmus Oswald.
Commentaria, in Nouas theoricas planetarum Georgii
Purbachii. Basel: Petri, 1556.
In this commentary of Peurbach’s New theory of the planets, all
of Peurbach’s individual diagrams depicting the epicyclic
motions of the celestial bodies are gathered together on one
plate. During the sixteenth and the early seventeenth
centuries, the spheres of the planets and of the fixed stars were
often described as solid, crystalline orbs. These illustrations of
hand-held physical models represented the complicated
machinations of a real, rather than ideal, Ptolemaic cosmos.
14
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Sacrobosco, Johannes.
Sphaera mundi. Venice: Scoti, 1490.
This edition of Sacrobosco’s textbook is graced with a beautiful
frontispiece. It shows a personification of Astronomy
enthroned in the center, holding an astrolabe in her right hand
and an armillary sphere representing the earth-centered system
of Ptolemy in her left. She is flanked by Ptolemy and Urania, the
muse of astronomy. The flora and fauna of earth are below
them, with the starry vault of the heavens above. It has a
section “On the motion of the eighth sphere” that is slightly
shorter than in the 1482 edition.
15
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Hyginus
De mundi et sphere. Venice: Sessa, 1512.
This work was usually called the Poeticon Astronomicon. It
describes and presents images of the constellations, arranged in
the same order as Ptolemy’s catalog of stars. The image on the
title page is interesting to compare with the frontispiece of the
1490 edition of Sacrobosco. In the Hyginus, Ptolemy has taken
the place of Astronomia in the center, where he is now
enthroned. He, instead of Astronomia as in the Sacrobosco, is
holding an astrolabe and an armillary sphere, while Astronomia
and Urania stand on the earth below, with the stars above
them. The zodiac is shown among several heavens above.
BibrefsHyginus1512
16
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Fine, Oronce.
De mundi sphaera. Paris: Colinaei, 1542.
Fine taught mathematics at the Collège Royal in Paris.
He wrote several works, including this general treatise of
astronomy. It describes the earth, the earth-centered cosmos,
and Ptolemy’s epicyclic system. Earlier in his career, Fine was an
editor for a Parisian printer. Among the works he edited were
Peurbach’s Theoricae novae planetarum, and an edition of
Apian’s Cosmographia. He was also a fine artist, creating this
stunning illustration himself. It depicts Urania, the muse of
astronomy, pointing to an armillary sphere, while the author
displays an astrolabe. Some years earlier, Fine had published a
book about a similar instrument, called an equatorium, used to
predict the positions of the planets. The same goal was
achieved in the Ptolemaic astronomical system, represented in
the armillary sphere in simple outline.
BibrefsFine1515
17
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Apian, Peter.
Cosmographia. Antwerp: Bontio, 1550.
This image clearly illustrates the earth-centered cosmos. The
earth is the central feature, surrounded by the spheres of the
moon, Mercury, Venus, the sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, all
encompassed by the eighth sphere of the fixed stars. Beyond
this lies the ninth, (“crystalline”) sphere that had been
introduced to account for precession. The tenth sphere is that
of the Primum Mobile (first mover), which was first described
by Aristotle. Beyond the Primum Mobile, which was moved by
the spirit of God, lies the celestial heaven, inhabited by God and
the fortunate elect.
18
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Fludd, Robert.
Utriusque cosmi maioris scilicet et minoris metaphysica,
physica atque technica historia. Oppenheim: Aere JohanTheodori de Bry ; typis Hieronymi Galleri, 1617.
Fludd presents the cosmos as a biblical allegory in this image.
The globe of the earth is illustrated with the figures of Adam
and Eve in the Garden of Eden; the narrative of Creation in
Genesis is represented by the fish of the sea and birds of the air.
The sun, moon, and planets created on the fourth day are
shown in the middle region. The thin sphere of the fixed stars is
insignificant compared to the abundant realm of the angels.
Divided according to tradition into three spheres, the angels
represent nine orders, or Angelic Choirs. Nearest to the sphere
of the fixed stars are the angels that serve as messengers to
humankind. In the next row, or heaven, are the angels
representing justice. The angels in the outermost row are the
Seraphim and Cherubim, who guard the throne of God. The
dove represents the Holy Spirit.
BibrefsFludd1617
19
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Gallucci, Giovanni Paolo.
Theatrum mundi, et temporis. Venice: Apud Ioannem
Baptistam Somascum, 1588.
This unusual image captures the three dimensional aspect of
the crystalline sphere of the fixed stars; it was more often
shown in cross section as a ring. The “eighth sphere,” as the
heading reads, is transparent, and the earth can be seen clearly
through it. While the illustration is depicting a tabletop model,
the idea that it conveys about the stars agrees with the
persistent perception of some astronomers that the stars were
held within a solid orb. Although this work appeared sixty years
after Copernicus introduced his sun-centered system, it depicts
only the earth-centered system, describing the epicycles of
Ptolemy.
20
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Clavius, Christoph.
In sphaeram Ioannis de Sacro Bosco commentaries.
Rome: Helianum, 1570.
Clavius was a gifted and influential Jesuit mathematician. As a
professor at the Collegio Romano, his impressive application of
mathematics to astronomy drew many more Jesuit students
into the field. Clavius understood the mathematical concepts of
the Copernican system, but he was a confirmed geocentrist,
arguing forcefully against the motion of the earth. Like Aristotle,
he believed that the unmoving earth was at the center of the
universe, as represented in this image.
BibrefsClavius1570
21
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Clavius, Christoph.
Operum mathematicorum . Mainz: sumptibus Antonii
Hierat; Excudebat Reinhardus Eltz, 1611.
The suggestion that the earth moved was an insult to Clavius’
faith. This title page features two illustrations of Bible passages
that were thought to conflict with the Copernican system. The
round vignette at the right shows Joshua and his army in battle,
and a miracle: “The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and
delayed going down” until they were victorious. This seemed to
prove that the sun moves; not the earth. In the round vignette
at the left, a miracle from the second book of Kings is shown.
When Hezekiah was about to die, God moved the shadow on a
sundial back ten degrees as a sign proving to Hezekiah that he
would live. This was taken to mean that the sun had moved
backward, again providing scriptural evidence that the sun, not
the earth, moves.
BibrefsClavius1611
22
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Scheiner, Christoph.
Disquisitiones mathematicae de controversiis et
novitatibus astronomicis. Ingolstadt: Ex typographeo
Ederiano apud Elisabetham Angermariam, 1614.
Aristotle’s spherical cosmos was admired by Christoph Scheiner,
a Jesuit professor of mathematics at Ingolstadt, Germany. Like
Clavius, Scheiner rejected the sun-centered system of
Copernicus. In this illustration, he demonstrates why it would
be impossible for the earth to rotate by providing a few
examples. Birds would lose their way and cannonballs would
miss their mark if the earth turned below them. The rotation of
the earth is indeed counterintuitive, and the apparent absurdity
of the idea was a major reason for its rejection until Galileo
began to convince astronomers of the logic of it in his Dialogue
of 1632. The sphere of the fixed stars continued to be
perceived as the motive force for the planets until motion was
finally awarded to the earth instead.
BibrefsScheiner1614
23
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Gassendi, Pierre.
Institutio astronomica. London: Typis Jacobi Flesher;
Prostant apud Gulielmum Morden, 1653.
This is an example of an illustration of the earth-centered
cosmos that is found in a work that actually argues against that
model. Gassendi preferred the sun-centered system, although
he considered it to be unproven. Gassendi subscribed to an
atomistic theory of his own, influenced by the ancient atomists
and René Descartes, but less mechanistic and differently
imbued with the divine. Gassendi suggested that the magnetic
force that Johann Kepler ascribed to the sun, holding the
planets around it in their orbits, was an effect of moving
particles.
BibrefsGassendi1653
24
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Lipstorp, Daniel.
Specimina philosophiae Cartesianae. Quibus accredit
ijusdem authoris Copernicus redivivus.
Leiden: apud Johannem & Danielem Elsevier. 1653.
This is another example of a geocentric image used in a book
arguing against that model. Lipstorp subscribed to the universal
system of Descartes. The heading above the illustration
describes it as the “absurd hypothesis” of Ptolemy. Lipstorp
and other astronomers objected not only to the complicated
epicycles (that cannot be shown in the image), but also to the
number of heavenly spheres. In the diagram, the ninth sphere,
beyond the eighth sphere of the fixed stars, was to account for
precession; the tenth, or primum mobile, caused the motion of
those below, and the eleventh was heaven, or the “coelum
empyreum.” Some astronomers substituted a sphere to
account for trepidation for the primum mobile. Some Jesuit
astronomers restricted the heavens to the three in scripture:
the empyreum, the sidereum, and the aereum, rejecting the
other spheres as mathematical constructs.
BibrefsLipstorp1650
25
Section 3: The Sun Takes Center Stage
Section 3:
The Sun Takes Center Stage
The Copernican system retained the sphere of the fixed
stars when it was presented in 1543, and for that reason
supporters of both the sun-centered universe and the
earth-centered cosmos visualized the stars in their
appointed outermost sphere. Below, the Ptolemaic,
Copernican and Tychonic models of the universe all
display the starry border. The sphere of stars was often
illustrated in the form of the figured zodiac. Not
apparent in the heliocentric images is the revolution of
the earth which replaced the motion of the stellar orb.
Johannes Blaeu. Atlas maior, siue, Cosmographia Blauiana, 1662 (v.1, intro).
Table of Contents
Johann Zahn. Specula physico-mathematico-historica notabilium ac mirabilium
sciendorum, 1696.
26
Section 3: The Sun Takes Center Stage
Cellarius, Andreas.
Harmonia macrocosmica, sev Atlas universalis et nouus.
Amsterdam: apud Joannem Janssonium, 1661.
When the printer, Janson, conceived this astronomical atlas, he
wished to present, in a realistic manner, “the concavity or
hollow and interior curve of the heavenly sphere;” his words
indicate the persistence of the idea of the spherical universe.
Cellarius was selected as the author of the text and chief
designer of the entire work. This richly illustrated handcolored
engraving of the sun-centered system portrays Copernicus in
the lower right corner, with Ptolemy across from him. Echoing
Aristotle, Copernicus had written in 1543 in his famous work On
the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres: “the universe is
spherical; partly because this form… is the most perfect of all.”
He then parts radically with the ancient philosopher: “But in the
center of all resides the Sun. Who, indeed, in this most
magnificent temple would put the light in another, or in a better
place than that one wherefrom it could at the same time
illuminate the whole of it?”
BibrefsCellarius1661
27
Section 3: The Sun Takes Center Stage
Scheuchzer, Johann.
Phisica sacra. Augsburg: [s.n.], 1734.
The sphere of the fixed stars was often represented by the
more visually exciting, figured zodiac. Known as the “Copper
Bible” (it illustrates the bible with images from the field of
science), this work contains hundreds of copperplate engravings
created by more than a dozen artists. This illustration of the
cosmos presents an extremely small representation of the
earth. It is interesting to compare this to the very prominent
earth featured in the Cellarius plate. In the seventeenth
century, the memory of the earth’s central position in the
geocentric universe continued to enhance its importance in
illustrations; by the eighteenth century it was sometimes
viewed as just another planet as in this engraving.
28
Section 3: The Sun Takes Center Stage
Wing, Vincent.
Harmonicon coeleste : or, The coelestiall harmony of the
visible world. London: Printed by Robert Leybourn, for
the Company of Stationers, 1651.
Early in his career, Vincent Wing was a geocentrist, but by the
time this book was printed, Wing and most serious astronomers
had accepted heliocentrism. The sphere of the fixed stars is
delicately shown at the perimeter of his diagram. Copernicus
himself retained the sphere of the fixed stars in part because it
provided a frame for his system, but it no longer moved the
spheres below it. Until the Copernican system was a proven
fact, the role of the outermost sphere of the stars was
undecided. After Galileo successfully argued that the suncentered system was true (his observations of a full set of
phases of Venus would not be visible in Ptolemy’s system) and
not simply a mathematical construct, astronomers eventually
accepted that the sphere of the stars did not move the spheres
of the planets.
BibrefsWing1651
29
Section 3: The Sun Takes Center Stage
Wright, Thomas.
Clavis coelestis. London: Printed for the Author; and sold
by E. Cave [et al], 1742.
In this dramatic image of the solar system, the sphere of the
fixed stars is replaced with the symbol of infinity: a snake eating
its tail. The heading pays homage to the very ancient Greek
philosopher, Pythagoras. One of his followers, Philolaus,
conceived of a cosmos that placed the earth among the other
planets, orbiting a central fire. Philolaus is indeed the ancient
author whose cosmology is cited by Copernicus in his
dedication to his 1543 work: “Some think that the Earth
remains at rest. But Philolaus the Pythagorean believes that,
like the Sun and Moon, it revolves around the Fire in an oblique
circle. Heraclides of Pontus and Ecphantus the Pythagorean
make the Earth move… like a wheel in a rotation… about its
own center.” In referring to ancient sources, Copernicus sought
to soften the shocking novelty of the orbit and rotation of the
earth in his system.
BibrefsWright1742
30
Section 4: The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Section 4:
The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Since ancient times, the heavenly realm of the planets
and stars was considered eternal and unchanging.
Aristotle wrote that no changes had ever been recorded
there. But observations of a new star and a comet
altered that perception.
In 1572, Tycho Brahe discovered a new star (we would
call it a supernova today) that appeared in the
constellation Cassiopia, in the sphere of the fixed stars.
The event proved that the realm of the stars underwent
change after all, and the stars seemed suddenly less fixed
in their orb.
In 1577, Brahe discovered a comet crashing through
spaces where spheres of the planets were supposed to
be. The discovery caused many astronomers to abandon
the idea of planetary spheres and accept that the space
they occupied was more fluid.
Tycho Brahe. De mundi aetherei, 1603.
Aristotle wrote that the sphere is the one shape that our
perfect cosmos must have. The new star in the heavens,
signifying change and therefore imperfection, together
with the loss of the planetary orbs, challenged the nested
spheres model.
Table of Contents
31
Section 4: The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Brahe, Tycho. Learned: Tico Brahæ, his astronomicall
coniectur of the new and much admired [star]. London:
by B[ernard] A[lsop] and T[homas F[awcet] for Michaell
[Sparks] and Samuell Nealand, 1632.
Tycho Brahe made regular observations of the stars and
planets, and one fall evening in 1572 while walking outdoors,
he looked up at the sky and saw something strange. He was
thoroughly familiar with the arrangement of the stars, and this
night there was a bright star in the constellation of Cassiopeia
that had never been there before. He had observed a new star,
or what we would call a supernova today. He was
overwhelmed by the experience: I was so astonished at this
sight that I was not ashamed to doubt the trustworthiness of
my own eyes…A miracle indeed…the greatest of all that have
occurred in the whole range of nature since the beginning of the
world. Aristotle had taught that no changes occurred in the
realm of the stars and planets, and this discovery challenged
that doctrine. This rare translation was the first appearance in
English of Brahe’s original 1573 work.
BibrefsBrahe1632
32
Section 4: The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Blaue, Johannes.
Atlas maior, siue, Cosmographia Blauiana. v.1.
Amsterdam: Labore & sumptibus Ioannis Blaeu, 1662.
“Your Majesty must on no account permit Tycho to leave,”
wrote a Danish nobleman to the king, “for Denmark would lose
its greatest ornament.” Tycho Brahe was one of the world’s
greatest astronomers, and he is shown here in this engraving of
a painting that was on the wall above one of his astronomical
instruments, the mural quadrant. This was part of his
observatory, Uraniborg, on the island of Hven. The king had
presented Brahe with liberal funds to design and build the
impressive facility, which dominated the island. In 1577, Brahe
observed a comet there and made the astounding discovery
that the comet was not confined to the sub-lunar sphere, but
had crashed through the spaces where the planetary spheres
were thought to be. This was a direct challenge to the
Aristotelian spheres of the planets. Tycho responded by
producing his own universal system without solid spheres,
presented in his work: The Most Recent Phenomena of the
Ethereal World. In that treatise he announced: “Truly there are
no Orbs in reality in the Heavens…but those which the experts
have invented for the sake of appearances…”
BibrefsBlaeu1662
33
Section 4: The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Kepler, Johannes.
De stella nova in pede Serpentarii. Prague: Typis Pauli
Sessii; impensis authoris 1606.
New stars continued to blot what Aristotle had called the
“incorruptible” realm of the celestial heavens. A new star in the
constellation Cygnus was discovered in 1600 by William Blaeu,
the astronomer/printer whose son produced the sumptuous
atlas in this case. That star is shown here in this work by Johann
Kepler, who himself discovered a new star in 1604 in the
constellation Opiuchus, the Serpent-Bearer. While Kepler
acknowledged change in the stellar sphere, he did not dissolve
it. He estimated its extent to be 2000 times larger than the
orbit of Saturn. He rejected the planetary spheres, writing (as a
passing phrase in his profoundly influential work of astronomy
published in 1609): “Now Tycho himself destroyed the notion of
real orbs.”
BibrefsKepler1606
34
Section 4: The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Kepler, Johannes.
De cometis libelli tres. Augsburg: Typis Andreae Apergeri,
1619.
Astronomers such as Georg von Peurbach had increased the
perception that the planetary spheres were solid, rather than
geometrical devices alone. But Tycho Brahe’s analysis of the
comet of 1577 shattered the solid spheres. Other comets
continued to soar through the now-fluid realm of the planets.
This book by Kepler, describing his observations of the comets
of 1607 and 1618, includes this impressive image showing the
trajectory of a comet passing through the orbits of Mercury,
Venus, and Earth. The comet with its tail is shown in its position
at various dates during its appearance.
35
Section 4: The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Beati, Gabriele.
Sphaera triplex … Rome: Typis Varesij, 1662.
Beati wished to show the physical appearance of the cosmos;
he did not show the purely geometrical lines of the planetary
orbits in this unusual image. The planets seem to float
aimlessly in a fluid medium, but Tycho Brahe’s system has been
shown to correspond to the image when superimposed over it.
The depiction of the sphere of the fixed stars as having an
irregular edge is also uncommon. The edge has hollows that
accommodate the supercelestial waters that cool the
firmament, according to Beati’s interpretation of scripture.
Invoking an ancient Greek comparison, Beati wrote that the
planets move through the fluid heaven as birds fly through air
or fishes swim in the sea. Christoph Clavius specifically rejected
this comparison, presenting it as an absurdity. He preferred
explanations derived from Aristotle’s Metaphysics, which
described “the number of all the spheres, both those which
move the planets and those which counteract these.”
BibrefsBeati1662
36
Section 5: The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
Section 5:
The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
John Wilkins. A discourse concerning a new world & another planet, 1640
(detail).
Inspired by the comet of 1577 that signaled the
rejection of the concept of planetary spheres,
Giordano Bruno pleaded to abolish the sphere of the
fixed stars as well. In 1584, he wrote: "Break and
hurl to earth with the resounding whirlwind of lively
reasoning...the adamantine walls of the...ultimate
sphere." The time had come. If the cosmos had no
solid planetary spheres, it was difficult to rationalize
one for the stars.
Some astronomers, such as Thomas Digges,
dissolved the sphere of the fixed stars after it lost its
role in moving the planets in the sun-centered
system; others were finally convinced by the comet.
Some broadened the sphere, depicting the stars as
occupying a thicker stellar orb; a few abolished it
altogether.
Table of Contents
37
Section 5: The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
Bruno, Giordano.
De triplici minimo et mensura… Frankfurt: Apud Ioannem
Wechelum & Petrum Fischerum , 1591.
After the comet of 1577, Bruno brazenly challenged
philosophers to dissolve the sphere of the stars along with the
spheres of the planets. Bruno believed, as did other
philosophers and many astronomers, that the elaborate
geometrical devices of the solid spheres were too far removed
from physical reality and from spirituality. This work is the first
of a trilogy published in Frankfurt. At his trial (Bruno was
burned at the stake in 1600), he stated that this trilogy distilled
his entire philosophy. Ostensibly a source book of Euclidean
proofs, this volume is instead a statement about what was
missing in mathematics: a link to the divinity of number. This
image, identified as Temple of Venus, represents the love and
divinity present in the atom and in the infinite universe. Bruno
carved the woodblocks for the prints himself.
“Convince our minds of the infinite universe. Rend in pieces the concave
and convex surfaces which would limit and separate so many elements
and heavens. Pour ridicule on deferent orbs and on fixed stars. Break
and hurl to earth with the resounding whirlwind of lively reasoning…,
the adamantine walls of the primum mobile and the ultimate sphere.”
-- Giordano Bruno. From his On the Infinite Universe and Worlds, 1584.
BibrefsBruno1591
38
Section 5: The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
Digges, Leonard.
A prognostication everlastinge of right good effect, with
additions by his sonne Thomas. London: by the widow
Orwin, 1596.
A few years before Bruno pleaded to abolish the sphere of the
fixed stars, Thomas Digges showed how it could be done in this
novel image of the stars released from their sphere. His text
provided the first English translation (of part of Book 1) of
Copernicus’ work, On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres.
Digges presented his extraordinary image as if an infinite
universe were a part of the great astronomer’s heliocentric
system, although that was not at all the case. The text on the
plate describes the stars as residing in an orb, but the fact that
it extends “infinitely up” abolished the traditional sphere.
Digges received his education from John Dee, a mathematician
and alchemist. Dee’s very extensive library included a copy of
Lucretius’ work on the infinity of the cosmos, but Digges (unlike
Bruno) does not cite the ancient author. Thomas Digges added
this image and the translation as an appendix to a new edition
of the almanac written by his father (Leonard).
BibrefsDigges1596
39
Section 5: The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
Gilbert, William.
De mundo nostro sublunari philosophia nova.
Amsterdam: apud L. Elzevirium 1651.
Gilbert is best known for his work published in 1600, De
magnete (On the Magnet). In the sixth chapter of that book,
Gilbert asks, regarding the Ptolemaic spheres, who “ever has
given rational proof that there are any such adamantine
spheres at all? No man hath shown this ever.” Regarding the
stars, Gilbert asserts that “they are not set in any sphaeric
framework or firmament (as is supposed), nor in any vaulted
structure.” Several of the cosmological ideas introduced in that
work are expanded upon in this later publication, which
includes this beautiful plate of the stars scattered freely in
space. Gilbert and other authors who no longer accepted
physical spheres continued to draw in the imaginary lines of the
planetary orbits. In this illustration, Gilbert does not draw in
the line of the orbit of earth, perhaps to indicate that the others
are theoretical rather than physical as well. He completed the
work by 1603 but it was not printed until long afterward.
BibrefsGilbert1651
40
Section 5: The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
Kircher, Athanasius.
Iter extaticum coeleste . Würzburg: sumptibus Joh. And.
& Wolffg. Jun. Endterorum haeredibus, prostat
Norimbergae apud eosdem, 1660.
Kircher was a Jesuit scholar and professor of mathematics at
the Collegio Romano. He was praised by a contemporary as
“the Phoenix amongst the learned men of this century.” He
encouraged and contributed to the exchange of ideas in the
sciences through correspondence with a huge number of
individuals. This work of astronomy is presented as a narrative
of his journey with two angels to the limits of the solar system,
with descriptions of the planets and cosmos. The engraved title
page shows Kircher with one of his angel guides. The universal
system shown is that of Tycho Brahe (the text compares and
illustrates a variety of universal systems). The sphere of the
fixed stars is expanded to a stellar region.
BibrefsKircher1660
41
Section 5: The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
Guericke, Otto von.
Experimenta nova (ut vocantur) magdeburgica de vacuo
spatio primum. Amsterdam: apud Joannem Janssonium
a Waesberge, 1672.
Guericke’s experiments on the properties of air lead him to
believe that above the atmosphere of earth, our planet was
separated from the moon and other planets by empty space.
Empty space also separated Saturn, the outermost planet in the
solar system, from the nearest star. From there the stars
extended into infinite space, separated from each other by
about the same distance as our sun from the closest star.
Guericke thereby erased the stellar sphere. This image is
important not only because the stars are dispersed but also
because it includes, for the first time, real named stars shown in
their proper places in the stellar region. In the upper left, Lyre
Lucida is identified. This refers to the brightest star in the
constellation Lyra, which is the star we know as Vega. In the
lower right is Canis major, or Sirius, the Dog Star.
BibrefsGuericke1672
42
Section 5: The Sphere of the Fixed Stars Dissolves
Mesmes, Jean Pierre de.
Les institutions astronomiques. Paris: De l'imprimerie de
Michel de Vascosan, 1557.
This earth-centered system has a markedly thick sphere of fixed
stars, made more unusual by the inclusion of a comet or
meteor. Until late in the sixteenth century, those events were
normally designated as occurring near the earth, leaving the
perfect realm of the stars unscathed. Though this work
primarily describes traditional aspects of the geocentric system
such as the motion of the stellar sphere and the division
between the earthly and the celestial regions, it is noted as one
of the earliest French works that also provided a description of
the Copernican system. The stars in that model were much
further away than in the geocentric system; perhaps that idea
was incorporated by expanding the stellar sphere and allowing
it a fiery visitor in this image.
BibrefsMesmes1557
43
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Section 6:
Motive Forces and the Stars
Théodore Barin. Le monde naissant, ou la création du monde, 1686.
As the sun-centered system gained acceptance, the role
of the stars in moving the planets ended. Without the
mechanism of the spheres, other sources of motion had
to be found that kept the planets in their orbits. Some
returned to Plato, who thought the celestial bodies were
besouled and could move themselves. Others called for
angels to move the planets, evoking Aristotle’s
requirement for eternal planetary movers in the
Metaphysics. A more efficient suggestion was God’s
commandment to move them by fiat.
William Gilbert offered magnetism as the motive force in
1600, which Kepler assigned to the sun, attracting the
planets' orbits around it. While the sun-centered system
required these new forces, Descartes' source of motion
required a new universal model. His theory of vortices
described a fluid medium in the universe that carried the
planets around our sun, and the planets of other stars
around theirs. The stars, far from acting as an eternal and
unchanging source of motion, were dispersed, and were
acted upon by the fluid medium.
Table of Contents
44
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Zahn, Johann.
Specula physico-mathematico-historica notabilium ac
mirabilium sciendorum. Nuremberg: sumptibus Joannis
Christophori Lochner, 1696.
Aristotle compared the ultimate motive force of the universe to
love. He wrote that the sphere of the fixed stars is moved by
God, who “produces motion as being loved, but all other things
move by being moved... motion in a circle is the first kind of
spatial motion, and this the first mover produces.” God’s power
to act by fiat was invoked by some astronomers as the motive
force keeping the planets in their orbits after the sphere of the
fixed stars dissolved. Introducing the section on astronomy in
this encyclopedic work of natural history is this dramatic image
of the biblical Creation. It includes a passage from Genesis, and
a quote from Psalms: “By the word of the Lord were the
heavens made, their starry host by the breath of his mouth.”
BibrefsZahn
45
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Gilbert, William.
De magnete. Londini :Excudebat Petrus Short, 1600.
Gilbert theorized that the earth is a giant magnet, and that in
place of the now dissolved sphere of the fixed stars, magnetism
held the planets in their orbits. This diagram records one of his
experiments with a terrella, a magnet that had been turned and
smoothed into a sphere, with three concentric metal orbs
around it. It is shown here in cross section, with the terrella
being the innermost circle, surrounded by the three metal orbs.
On the surface of the terrella and of each orb, Gilbert had
placed compass needles. The dashed lines show that the lines
of attraction on each orb match the directions of those on the
terrella. Gilbert wrote that “The centre of the magnetic virtues
in the earth is the centre of the earth; and in a terrella is the
centre of the stone.” Gilbert was an animist in the tradition of
Plato; he believed that the earth, planets, and stars had souls.
His experiments with magnets showed him that this soul acts
“without error, and exerts an unending action, quick, definite,
and constant.”
BibrefsGilbert1600
46
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Kepler, Johann.
Astronomia nova. [Heidelberg : G. Voegelinus], 1609.
Kepler applied Gilbert’s magnetism to the sun as the motive
force of the cosmos. Kepler presented an analogy, illustrated in
this diagram, to describe how the sun’s magnetism moved the
planets around it. He described how ferrymen sometimes
suspend a cable high above a river and tether the boat to it with
another rope, and that in this way, the ferrymen can make “the
skiffs go in circles, and play a thousand tricks, without touching
the bottom or the banks, but by the use of the oar alone,
directing the…flow of the river to their own ends.” In the
diagram, the sun is at one focus within the circle. “Let there be
a circular river CDE, FGH, and in it a sailor who revolves his
oar…The impulse will be less at C than at F, since our river is
weak at C and strong at F” corresponding to the shifting speed
of a planet.
BibrefsKepler1609
47
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Descartes, Rene.
Principia philosophia. Amsterdam: Apud Ludovicum
Elzevirium, 1644
The ancient philosopher Empedocles demonstrated an early
cosmological vortex theory by dropping tea leaves into a
container of water as he stirred it. The theory proposed infinite
worlds that formed and perished, cycling back into the infinite.
In this masterpiece of physics, Descartes included a chapter on
“the visible universe” in which he presented a complex,
evolutionary universal system based on vortices. He described
how the planets are carried around the sun through an analogy:
“If some straws are floating in the eddy of a river, where the
water doubles back on itself and forms a vortex as it swirls; we
can see that it carries them along and makes them move in
circles with it.” He described the plate: “If S, for example, is the
Sun, F,f will be fixed stars, and we will understand that
numerous others exist.” The line snaking through the vortices is
the path of a comet.
BibrefsDescartes1644
48
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Seller, John.
Atlas coelestis. London: Sold by Ier: Seller & Cha: Price at
[the] Hermitage & Phil: Lea at [the] Atlas & Hercules in
Cheapside, 1700.
Aristotle wrote that an infinite stellar region cannot rotate. In
the earth-centered system, the sphere of the fixed stars did
rotate, so it had to be limited in depth. Its motion in turn set
the planets in motion. Copernicus stopped the motion of the
sphere of the fixed stars and made the earth move instead.
This presented a problem: how are the planets moved?
While some philosophers proposed that the planets had souls
and could move themselves, Descartes sought a mechanical
explanation.
This image contrasts the universe of Copernicus with that of
Descartes. The Copernican system focused on our solar system
(this depiction shows the stars dispersed), whereas the
Cartesian cosmos equated our sun with the other stars and
emphasized the vast cosmos. Descartes in effect removed our
sun from a local context and placed it among the stars, and with
them, it was acted upon by the fluid medium.
BibrefsSeller1700
49
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Newton, Isaac.
The mathematical principles of natural philosophy.
London: Printed for Benjamin Motte, 1729. Volume 1.
While the Cartesian system would live on in the popular
imagination for decades, Newton’s Principia (in the view of
many scientists) effectively replaced all previous proposals of
motive force with gravity. Mutual attraction, combined with
inertia, produced a closed planetary orbit around the sun; a
vortex, Newton explained, was neither necessary nor desirable.
Newton also politely clarified why magnetism was not a
sufficient cause. This frontispiece features a novel view of a
novel idea: the sun acting by gravitational attraction on the
planets.
BibrefsNewton1729
50
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Newton, Isaac.
The mathematical principles of natural philosophy.
London: Printed for Benjamin Motte, 1729. Volume 2.
In Book II, Newton describes extensive experiments that he
carried out with pendulums in his investigations into the nature
of gravity. In Book III, he stated that gravity affects the bodies
of the planets in the solar system in the same way that it pulls
bodies toward the earth. Proposition VI continues: “If the
circumsolar Planets were supposed to be let fall [as a
pendulum] at equal distances from the Sun, they would, in their
descent towards the Sun, describe equal spaces in equal times.”
BibrefsNewton1729
51
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Pemberton , Henry.
A view of Sir Isaac Newton's philosophy.
Printed by S. Palmer, 1728.
This recounting of Newton’s laws of motion is also illustrated
with Newton’s pendulum experiments. Gravity would seem to
be the ultimate motive force, but Newton did not accept that it
was inherent in matter. The idea that an inherent soul moved
matter, as in Gilbert’s work, had been replaced with the idea
that matter was passive, and God gave matter motion. Kepler
suggested that the planets were endowed with intelligence, or
Mind, in his early work, but a quote from his Epitome
Astronomiae Copernicanae is telling of the change: “I deny that
the celestial movements are the work of Mind.” Kepler
believed, as would Descartes, that God set matter in motion
and also continually keeps it in motion. Newton wrote in his
Principia that God is substantially present: “In him all things are
contained and moved, but he does not act on them nor they on
him;” God was simply always and everywhere.
BibrefsPemberton1728
52
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Section 7:
Plurality of Worlds
Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle. Entretiens sur la pluralite des mondes, 1686
[detail].
Once the stars were scattered, they were celebrated as
suns with their own satellites. Descartes' mechanism of
vortices was only a part of his theory of motion published
in 1644. It also included the concept of multiple solar
systems derived from the ancient atomists. His influential
philosophy, combined with his humble images of stars
with satellites moving in a fluid medium, inspired many
interpretations.
The arresting images of the Cartesian cosmos are
fascinating testaments to a radical shift in the perception
of the universe. They dramatically placed our sun among
the other stars; it joined them in the heavens. In
common with our sun, the other stars were given their
own planets. The idea that other planets have similarities
to earth encouraged a discussion of extraterrestrial life.
Christiaan Huygens wrote in 1698 that "it's not
improbable that the rest of the planets have their Dress
and Furniture, nay and their Inhabitants too as well as
this Earth of ours."
Table of Contents
53
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Huygens, Christiaan.
The celestial worlds discover'd. London: Printed for
Timothy Childe, 1698.
Huygens proposed that “there are a multitude of Earths
inhabited and adorned as well as our own.” He described our
solar system, suggesting that it demonstrated that the other
planets had similarities to earth: they are round (and therefore
also rotate), they receive light from the sun, and two of them
(Jupiter and Saturn) have moons just as earth has a moon. He
then concluded: “Now since in so many things they thus agree,
what can be more probable than that in others they agree too;
and that the other planets are as beautiful and as well stock’d
with Inhabitants as the Earth?”
BibrefsHuygens1698
54
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Huygens, Christaan.
Cosmotheoros, eller Werlds Beskådare. Upsala : Tryckt på
egen bekostnad af Johan Edman, Kongl. Acad.
Boltryctare, 1774.
In thinking about life on other planets, Huygens even tried to
imagine how the sky would appear to the inhabitants. The
image of Saturn, for example, illustrates Huygens’ discussion of
the appearance of that planet’s ring to its residents: “Those
that live about the poles within the arches CAD, EBF, (if the cold
will suffer anybody to live there) will never have sight of the
ring. Those that dwell between the Polar Circle CD and the
Equator TV” would see the ring, but as the planet turned, the
ring would hide the sun, causing sudden darkness to fall. At
that time, “their Moons are their only Comfort.”
BibrefsHuygens1774
55
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Huygens, Christaan.
Opera varia. Lugduni Batavorum : Apud Janssonios
Vander Aa, 1724. Vol. 1. (portrait)
Huygens was a brilliant mathematician and physicist. His
investigations in optical techniques and astronomy led to his
discovery of Titan, the first of Saturn’s moons to be sighted. He
also determined that Saturn was surrounded by a ring (the
nature of its irregular appearance had been a mystery). As a
result of his extensive astronomical observations, Huygens was
able to contribute more realistic ideas regarding the conditions
for life on Saturn and on the other planets than other authors
on the topic.
BibrefsHuygens1724
56
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Scheiner, Christoph.
Rosa Ursina siue Sol. Bracciani: Apud Andream Phaeum
Typographum Ducalem, 1630.
This illustration depicts various astronomical instruments used
by Scheiner, including an early heliometer used to make
observations of the sun (in bottom panel). Prior to Galileo,
many scientists believed that the sun, moon, planets and stars
were perfect heavenly bodies, comprised of refined materials
entirely different in nature from those of the earth. In addition
to his studies of the moon, Galileo also observed sunspots,
phenomena that Scheiner studied in great detail. The
observations of both men proved that the sun was imperfect,
suggesting that it may be made of some of the same basic
elements that constitute the earth. Since the sun is a star, this
made the stars valid subjects of physical investigation. For most
scientists this tended to erase the old division between the
celestial bodies and the earth. (Scheiner however favored a
theory that the sunspots were perfect planets orbiting the sun.
This theory preserved the earlier doctrine of a perfect sun).
BibrefsScheiner1630
57
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Wilkins, John.
A discourse concerning a new world & another planet.
London: Printed by Iohn Norton for Iohn Maynard, 1640.
Published only a few years after Galileo’s Dialogue of the Two
World Systems, Wilkin’s work subtly acknowledges that the
heliocentric system was not yet accepted by everyone. He was
tentative in his statement that several scientists actually
believed that the earth was one of the planets: “Now if our
earth were one of the Planets (as it is according to them) then
why may not another of the Planets be an earth?” Wilkins
chose a celestial body closer to home to prove that life may
exist beyond earth. He focused on the moon. He asserted its
similarities to earth: the moon is solid, shines by reflected light,
has dark and light spots indicating sea and land, and has
mountains and valleys. Wilkins suggested that the moon was
inhabited, and that it would be worthwhile to launch a
spacecraft there to meet its residents.
58
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Descartes, Rene.
Principia philosophia. Amstelodami: Apud Ludovicum &
Danielem Elzevirios, 1656.
This image from Descartes’ master work shows the sun in the
center, but the novel aspect of his system (first published in
1644) was that our sun was in fact not the center of anything
except our own planetary system. The laws of motion of
Descartes and of Newton were not limited to our solar system
as were previous ideas of motive forces. Instead, they were
universal laws, extending to all matter in the universe.
Descartes referred in this work to the ancient atomist Lucretius,
who once wrote: “Granted that empty space extends without
limit in every direction and seeds [atoms] innumerable are
rushing on countless courses through an unfathomable universe
under the impulse of perpetual motion, it is in the highest
degree unlikely that this earth and sky is the only one to have
been created…In other regions there are other earths and
various tribes of men and breeds of beasts.”
BibrefsDescartes1656
59
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Mallement, Claude.
L'ouvrage de la creation. Paris : Chez la veuve Claude
Thiboust et Pierre Esclassan, 1679.
Mallement was a professor of philosophy at the Collège du
Plessis, where his students no doubt studied his version of the
Cartesian system of vortices as presented in this charming
illustration. It shows the sun circling around the central whirl
rather than occupying the center of it. Only Mercury orbits the
sun itself, while the center of the orbits of the other planets is
the central whirl. Mallement had an interesting theory
regarding comets in the Cartesian cosmos. He suggested that
as they cycled through the vortices and into our solar system,
comets could bring waste material from the edges of the vortex
to the earth, introducing ill winds that may affect health.
Although incorrect, Mallement’s physical explanation did
suggest that comets were causes with effects rather than
omens.
BibrefsMallement1679
60
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Fontenelle, M. de Bernard Le Bovier.
Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes. Paris ; Lyon: Chez
T. Amaulry, 1686.
Inspired by Descartes’ simple delineation of vortices, this
imaginative image introducing Fontenelle’s text takes the
diagram to a rich new level. The illustration shows great depth.
The sun appears as the most distant point, and the planets are
shown in perspective, with Mercury very far from the viewer,
near the sun, while Jupiter and Saturn with their moons are
nearer to the viewer. In the foreground, a profusion of stars are
shown with their satellites. It is an extraordinarily detailed view
of multiple solar systems. The text is a witty treatment of
Descartes’ cosmology, but also includes a surprisingly thorough
discussion of life on other planets.
61
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Fontenelle, M. de Bernard Le Bovier.
Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes. Amsterdam: Chez
Pierre Mortier.. 1701.
Fontenelle’s work was written in the form of an imaginary
conversation between an astronomer and a young marquise.
The noblewoman posed questions of her tutor about the
universe, and his answers provided an introduction to
astronomy that emphasized the Cartesian cosmos. While
Descartes had presented the stars as suns in an unlimited
plenum, Fontenelle went further: he gave the stars satellites
with inhabitants. Fontenelle’s work became very popular, going
through many editions. For this reason, Fontenelle’s
conception of Descartes’ system became widely known. The
frontispiece of this edition shows the astronomer and marquise
in the garden, with the solar system and stars above.
BibrefsFontenelle1701
62
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Bonnycastle, John.
An introduction to astronomy. London: Printed for J.
Johnson, 1787.
This plate shows our solar system amidst six others. Other
systems are cut off by the symbol of the snake eating its tail,
indicating that the view is a partial one, and perhaps that it
extends beyond the frame infinitely into space. In the text,
Bonnycastle credits the Englishman Francis Bacon (rather than
the Florentine, Galileo) as finally disproving the ancient systems
that denied a plurality of worlds. Until Bacon, he wrote, “Plato
and Aristotle were referred to as the arbiters of every dispute,
from whose authority there was no appeal.” The illustration of
multiple worlds clearly contradicts a passage from Plato’s
Timaeus: “…the Creator compounded the world out of all the
fire and all the water and all the air and all the earth, leaving no
part of any of them…outside; leaving no remnants out of which
another such world might be created.”
BibrefsBonnycastle1787
63
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Maupertuis, Pierre.
Discours sur les differentes figures des astres. Paris: Chez
G. Martin, Jean-Baptiste Coignard, & les Freres Guerin,
1742.
Within the context of a plurality of worlds, Maupertuis
discussed the gravitational affects of satellites on their stars.
He suggested that the opaque bodies of planets orbiting around
their stars could alter the appearance of stars. He also
proposed that the rapid rotation of stars affects their shapes so
that stars vary in form, as shown in the mezzotint. Maupertuis
suggested that some stars had been flattened in the course of
their rotation and as they turn we view them alternately as
face-on and edge-on, and that this is the cause of the
appearance of variable stars. Maupertuis is perhaps best
known for his principle of least action. It determines the shape
of an ellipse under the influence of gravity. He once wrote a
mathematical treatise on the maxima and the minima. He must
have had a penchant for extremes, as he also published works
about the universe and the embryo.
BibrefsMaupertuis1742
64
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Euler, Leonhard.
Theoria motuum planetarum et cometarum. Berlin:
Sumtibus Ambrosii Haude, 1744.
This beautiful image of the plurality of worlds appears to be a
version of the upper section of the Dopplemayr plate (also in
this section), complete with angels unfurling the fabric of the
universe. Euler’s prodigious researches in theoretical
mechanics influenced his interpretation of Cartesian cosmology.
Euler defined Descartes’ fluid plenum as a specific type of ether,
and described its mechanical properties; he proposed that
magnetism influenced its motion.
BibrefsEuler1744
65
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Doppelmayr, Johann.
Atlas coelestis. Nuremberg: sumpt. Heredum
Homannianorum, 1742.
The heavens are opened up to reveal the infinite universe of
worlds in this glorious image. Multiple solar systems,
symbolizing a portion of the universe extending beyond the
frame, surround our own. Portraits of astronomers whose
scientific investigations eventually led society to an
understanding of this marvelous state of affairs are shown in
the foreground. Ptolemy, representing knowledge of the
ancient world, is at left. Next to him is Copernicus, who points
to his sun-centered system, infinitely mirrored. At right are
Johannes Kepler and Tycho Brahe. While some ancient authors,
including Lucretius, asserted multiple worlds, others, such as
Plato and Aristotle, rejected them. Aristotle wrote: “A plurality
of universes is in fact impossible if this world contains the
entirety of matter, as in fact it does.” Beyond honoring Ptolemy,
this illustration is a dramatic affirmation that in the
Enlightenment period, the ancient world no longer ruled.
BibrefsDoppelmayer1742
66
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Barin, Théodore.
Le monde naissant. Utrecht: Pour la Compagnie des
Libraires, 1686.
In presenting his cosmology, Descartes made explicit references
to the biblical creation narrative in his Principles of Philosophy.
He described the waters above the firmament as the vortices of
other stars, and the waters below the firmament as the sun’s
fluid planetary heavens. This was a welcome passage to those
readers who wished to ground themselves within a familiar
framework while interpreting the novel universal theory of
Descartes. Barin was thus able to present this image of the stars
and planets cycling in their vortices as a representation of the
fourth day of creation in Genesis.
BibrefsBarin1686
67
Section 8: Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Section 8:
Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Alexander Keith Johnston. Atlas of astronomy, 1855 (detail).
The mathematical principles of the Copernican model
resulted in pushing the sphere of the stars many thousands
of times further away from the sun than it had been in the
earth-centered cosmos. When the sun-centered system
gained acceptance in the seventeenth century,
astronomers seized the telescope to directly test the
numbers. The quest for stellar parallax - a method for
measuring distance to the stars-- began in earnest with
Robert Hooke in 1669. He set his sites on Gamma
Draconis, the bright star in the head of the constellation
Draco, the Dragon, but his result was uncertain. In 1838,
Friedrich Bessel solved the problem of measuring stellar
distance by focusing on Cygnus 61, a small star in the
constellation Cygnus, the celestial Swan. Using a
precision instrument called a heliometer, he calculated it
to be over 60 trillion miles away.
Table of Contents
68
Section 8: Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Flamsteed, John.
Atlas céleste. Paris, Chez F.G. Deschamps [et chez]
l'auteur, 1776.
“Whether the Earth move or stand still hath been a Problem,
that since Copernicus revived it, hath much exercised the Wits
of our best modern Astronomers,” wrote Robert Hooke in 1669.
He then declared his intention to use stellar parallax to prove
that the earth does move. He selected Gamma Draconis, the
star that appeared near the zenith of Gresham College, where
he resided. He cut a hole in the roof of his apartment, another
through the ceiling of the second floor, and made his
observations lying on a sofa from the first. He published his
result as 15” of arc, but his claim was not widely accepted.
James Bradley and John Flamsteed (whose accurate star
observations inspired this atlas) also attempted the parallax of
the Dragon Star, but like Hooke, they were foiled by the
aberration of light. Bradley discovered that phenomenon
during his observations of the star (on the head of the Dragon
constellation near Hercules).
BibrefsFlamsteed1776
69
Section 8: Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Horrebow, Peder.
Basis astronomiae; sive, Astronomiae pars mechanica.
Havniae : Apud viduam beati Hieron. Christiani Paulli,
1735.
Horrebow was a devoted student of Olaus Roemer (1644-1710).
This work by Horrebow includes an important paper that he
had found among his teacher’s manuscripts, entitled The
Moveable Earth, or the Parallax of the Annual Orbit from
Observations of Sirius and Lyra, Carried out at Copenhagen in
the Years 1692 and 1693. Roemer’s goal in his search for stellar
parallax, as noted in the title, was to prove that the earth
“moved” (orbited the sun). This fascinating engraving illustrates
the transit instrument that Roemer invented and used in his
home observatory in Copenhagen. The instrument is the
horizontal pipe on which the attached telescope moved freely
along the meridian (vertically). Two cones, joined at their bases
and hiding the tube of the telescope, reduced any slight
warping. A small lantern is mounted to illuminate the mirror.
At the right end of the pipe, a microscope is attached. Parallel
threads divided the focus of both the telescope and the
microscope, and the clocks timed the positions of the stars.
Roemer worried that his clocks were responding to
temperature changes (later confirmed), and for that reason he
did not publish his manuscript.
BibrefsHorrebow1735
70
Section 8: Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Jamieson, Alexander.
A celestial atlas. London : Published by G. & W.B.
Whittaker..., T. Cadell..., and N. Hailes..., 1822.
In 1837 Friedrich Struve published a parallax of Vega, in the
upper right of the constellation Lyra on this plate, but he
presented his results as uncertain. Finally, in 1838 Friedrich
Bessel successfully detected the parallax of a star. Cygnus 61,
the object of Bessel’s work, is too small for a designation in this
atlas, appearing on the right wing of the swan in the
constellation Cygnus. Bessel had meticulously recorded sixteen
observations of the star every night for a year, followed by a
complicated program of mathematical analysis to cancel out
motions not relevant to his task. The parallax he measured was
0.3”, an incredibly small angle to measure. From this he
calculated the star to be 60 trillion miles from earth. Ptolemy
had estimated the sphere of the fixed stars to be about 60
million miles from earth. Bessel, clearly “thinking outside the
sphere,” expanded Ptolemy’s universe by a million times.
BibrefsJamieson1822
71
Section 8: Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Arago, Francois.
Popular astronomy. London: Longman, Brown, Green,
and Longmans, 1855. v. 1 .
It takes a full year to accumulate the measurements required to
determine the parallax of a star. The position of the star is
recorded regularly as the earth makes a complete orbit around
the sun. The distance of the stars from earth is so great that
the earth’s orbit does not provide a baseline large enough to
easily perceive a change in the position of any star. Detecting
stellar parallax was a major challenge for astronomers until one
instrument finally caught up to the task: a Fraunhofer
heliometer, shown in this illustration. Heliometers have a
divided lens that allows the viewer to see two magnified images
at once. When Joseph von Fraunhofer applied an achromatic
lens (refracting light without color distortion) to a heliometer of
his design, the world finally had an instrument that provided
the precision required to detect parallax in the hands of the
talented astronomer Friedrich Bessel.
BibrefsArago1855
72
Section 8: Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Meissner, August Gottlieb.
Astronomischer Hand-Atlas zu Rüdigers Kenntniss des
Himmels. Leipzig : bey Siegfried Lebrecht Crusius, 1805.
The brightest star in the Centaur constellation, Alpha Centauri
(in the left hoof) was the object of an effort to detect parallax
by Thomas Henderson. He was successful and his work
preceded that of Bessel, but he initially was not confident of his
results and did not publish them until 1839. Henderson and
Friedrich Struve (whose observations also proved to be
accurate) were praised for their work at the ceremony honoring
Friedrich Bessel’s achievement. John Herschel, the son of
William Herschel, presided over the ceremony, bestowing upon
Bessel the Royal Society’s Gold Medal. John Herschel
commended all three men as “among the fairest flowers of
civilization” for passing a “great and hitherto impassable barrier
to our excursions into the sidereal *starry+ universe.” He
declared that their work resulted in “the greatest and most
glorious triumph which practical astronomy has ever
witnessed.”
BibrefsMeissner1805
73
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Section 9:
From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Works depicting the “plurality of worlds” described
multiple solar systems, including ours, scattered
indefinitely in space. Solar systems were not thought of
as being organized into a star system, or galaxy, until the
eighteenth century.
Thomas Wright realized that the intense collection of
stars along the Milky Way was an indication that our sun
and the other stars are part of a star system with a
particular structure. In 1750 he described the sun as
orbiting a central point, and suggested that it did so
along with the other stars. He suggested two shapes that
the star system could take that would account for the
appearance of the stars in the Milky Way: a ring of stars
that he compared to the plane of the planets or a hollow
sphere.
Thomas Wright. An original theory or new hypothesis of the universe, 1750.
Immanuel Kant recognized that Newton's physical laws
corresponded to Wright's ring (not to his sphere), and in
1755 Kant developed an evolutionary cosmology that
compared the formation of the solar system to that of
the galaxies by the same natural laws.
Table of Contents
74
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Wright, Thomas.
An Original Theory…of the Universe…solving…the
general phaenomena of the visible creation and
particularly the Via Lactea. London: Printed for the
author, 1750.
The illustration shows a perspective view of a section of the
Milky Way. Wright suggested that if a viewer is near the
center at A, the stars would appear diffuse toward either B
or C, and crowded if looking toward F, G, or D. To Wright, the
Milky Way was a vital clue that our sun and the other stars
are arranged in a stellar system.
BibrefsWright1750
75
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Wright, Thomas. An Original Theory… 1750.
Novel diagram of sun orbiting a central point: Wright
sought a cause to explain why the stars would be arranged
in a particular pattern. The cause of the arrangement of
our planetary system is that the planets orbit a central
point (the sun). Wright proposed that the sun and the
other stars also orbit a central point.
BibrefsWrightStarsOrbit
76
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Wright, Thomas. An Original Theory… 1750.
Ring-shaped galaxy: Wright reasoned that the star
system may therefore take the same shape as our solar
system, or the ring of Saturn. He provided double or
multiple ring options. He proposed that the center of the
star system was terrestrial in nature; some of his
illustrations show it with land and sea (today we know
that the centers of galaxies are not solid bodies but black
holes).
BibrefsWrightRing
77
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Wright, Thomas. An Original Theory… 1750.
Spherical galaxy: The second shape that Wright
suggested for the galaxy was a hollow sphere. The view
from within the shell of stars would approximate the
perspective view of the Milky Way, as would the view
from within the ring shape.
BibrefsWrightSphere
78
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Wright, Thomas. An Original Theory… 1750.
Cross section of spherical galaxy: Had Wright used his
suggested central terrestrial body in this image it would
have appeared very much like the Aristotelian universal
system. Instead he shows his proposed philosophical
center (where today we would place a black hole). In the
ancient system, the earth was at the center. In Wright’s
galaxy, our solar system is located (though not visible
here) within the outer sphere of stars.
BibrefsWrightCross
79
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Bode, Johann Elert.
.Allgemeine Betrachtungen über das Weltgebäude.
Berlin: [s.n.], 1812.
Bode, best known for his spectacular star atlas published a
decade earlier, illustrates the position of the Milky Way in both
hemispheres, and the location of stars along its length. The
plate is used here to demonstrate that the Milky Way appears
to us as a white brushstroke in the sky as shown. Before the
work of Thomas Wright, it was perceived as completely
separate from our solar system but in fact our sun is a part of
the Milky Way. It only appears to be separate because the
perspective view offered by our sun’s location within the galaxy
makes it appear to be a distant unrelated ribbon.
BibrefsBode1812
80
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Hevelius, Johannes.
Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia. Gedani:
typis J.-Z. Stollii, 1690.
Edmond Halley sailed to St. Helena, an isolated tropical island in
the middle of the Atlantic, to record the positions of over 300
stars in the southern hemisphere. The resulting catalog
published in 1679 gained more attention after Hevelius
included Halley’s stars in this beautiful atlas. In 1718, Halley
published an article in the Philosophical Transactions noting
that three of the stars (including Arcturus in Bootes) had
changed position since Ptolemy recorded them in ancient
times. Halley proposed that stars are not fixed in their
positions, but have their own proper motion. Thomas Wright
quoted nearly the entire brief article in his Original Theory in
order to prepare his readers for his proposal that our sun orbits
a central point. “If they move,” he wrote, “the Sun must also.”
BibrefsHevelius1690
81
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Kant, Immanuel.
Allgemeine geschichte und theorie des himmels. Zeitz :
Bei Wilhelm Webel, 1798.
Kant’s Universal natural history and theory of the heavens, first
published in 1755, was an influential work of cosmology. It
presented a comprehensive and detailed theory describing how
the celestial bodies were formed, the physical laws that govern
them, and how they may be transformed in the future. Kant
credited Thomas Wright for providing some ideas for his
cosmology, but the role of gravity was not one of them. Wright
seemed unaware of the limitations that gravity would place on
the shapes of galaxies, believing for example that stars in his
spherical galaxy could orbit around the center in different
directions. Kant recognized that Wright’s ring-shaped galaxy,
and not his sphere, followed the universal laws of gravitation.
He agreed with Wright that the galaxy may take the same form
as the solar system, but he understood why: it was formed
according to the same laws.
BibrefsKant1798
82
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
Flammarion, Camille.
L'atmosphère météorologie populaire. Paris : Librairie
Hachette et cie., 1888.
An artist depicts a medieval missionary who has found the point
where the sky and the earth meet. With his head poking
through the stars, he perfectly embodies our exhibit theme,
“thinking outside the sphere.” The charming and irresistibly
captivating wood engraving (in this work on earth’s atmospheric
layers) is by an anonymous artist. It shows the influence of the
Pre-Raphaelite art movement and is inspired by fifteenth
century illustrations of the biblical narrative of Ezekiel’s vision.
The image is a striking metaphor for those aspects of astronomy
that always lie just beyond our grasp. The pilgrim pushes the
envelope of the unknown. The stellar sphere first bounded the
geocentric universe, then the heliocentric one. As our view of
the stars expanded, the sphere of the stars was proposed as a
shape for our star system. What lies beyond?
BibrefsFlammarion1888
83
Section 10: The First Map of the Galaxy
Section 10:
The First Map of the Galaxy
Alexander Keith Johnston. Atlas of astronomy, 1855 (detail).
If the stars were part of a star system, how could it be
measured and its boundaries defined? William Herschel
used a handmade, twenty-foot telescope to chip away at
what he called the "construction of the heavens." He
swept the skies to record the arrangement of the visible
stars, and in 1785 published our first map of the galaxy. It
placed the sun quite centrally within it, in what seemed a
philosophical return to the earth-centered system that
featured "us."
Another of Herschel's great contributions was to
establish that our solar system is moving through space.
Wright and Kant had assumed its motion, but Herschel
proved it through rigorous analysis of telescopic
observations. He determined that the sun was moving
toward the constellation Hercules. Along with our sun,
we were on our way somewhere, moving vast distances
through galactic space.
Table of Contents
84
Section 10: The First Map of the Galaxy
Bode, Johann Elert.
Vorstellung der Gestirne auf XXXIV Kupfertafeln nach der
Pariser Ausgabe des Flamsteadschen Himmelsatlas.
Berlin und Stralsand: Bey Gottlieb August Lange, 1782 .
The bright star Arcturus is found in the knee of the constellation
Bootes in this atlas. It was one of three stars (with Aldebaran
and Sirius) that had been discovered by Edmond Halley in 1718
to have changed positions in the sky. In 1775, Tobias Mayer
confirmed its motion and added two dozen more stars that
exhibited proper motion. Mayer wrote that “it is not enough to
know that certain stars are endowed with their own proper
motion, but we must also ascertain precisely which are the
stars, in what region of the sky they move, and with what
speed” if astronomers are to make accurate catalogs.
BibrefsBode1782
85
Section 10: The First Map of the Galaxy
Herschel, William.
“On the Proper Motion of the Sun and Solar System”
Philosophical Transactions 73:247-283 (January 1, 1783).
Herschel found that the determination of proper motion posed
a tantalizing question about our sun: if it moves, where is it
going? In explaining his approach, he begins by stating that the
theory of attraction dictates that if several stars move, they all
must move, including our sun. He then presented the problem
of how to discriminate the sun’s motion from all of the other
proper motions that the stars display. Herschel impressively
succeeded in the analytical feat of cancelling out the individual
stars’ proper motions in order to isolate the sun’s motion. He
determined that the sun was indeed moving through space, and
that it was moving toward the constellation Hercules, as shown
in the diagram.
BibrefsHerschel1783
86
Section 10: The First Map of the Galaxy
Herschel, William.
“On the construction of the heavens”
Philosophical Transactions 75:213-266. (January 1,
1785).
When Charles Messier published a catalog of nebula that he
had observed using a small instrument, Herschel knew he could
discover more with his 20 foot handmade telescope. In 1783
with the assistance of his sister Carolyn, he began making what
he called “sweeps” of specific areas of the sky each night,
finding many more of these objects. Soon Herschel realized
that he could build a composite view of all of the stars, thus
arriving at a general idea of the shape of the universe. He
outlined his technique for this new goal. “I call it Gaging the
Heavens, or the Star-Gage.” In January of 1785, Herschel
published the results of his survey: our first map of the galaxy,
with our sun near the center. It appeared to Herschel that our
galaxy branched in two for a portion of its length. Although
Herschel soon determined his map to be flawed, it was the best
we had until the twentieth century.
BibrefsHerschel1785
87
Section 10: The First Map of the Galaxy
Johnston, Alexander Keith.
Atlas of astronomy. Edinburgh and London: William
Blackwood and Sons, 1855.
Johnston’s atlas shows Herschel’s map of the galaxy in the top
right, and a binary star system at left. Herschel had assumed
that the stars were generally of equal brightness. This would
indicate that stars that appeared faint were further away while
the bright stars were closer to us. He used double stars to help
gauge distance, comparing a faint one next to a bright one. His
own studies of double stars later proved that many orbited
around each other, disproving the “faint equals far” rule and
calling into question the accuracy of his galaxy map.
BibrefsJohnston1855
88
Section 10: The First Map of the Galaxy
Mitchel, Ormsby M.
The planetary and stellar worlds. London: T. Nelson and
Sons...,1861 .
This image illustrates Herschel’s map, surrounded by two star
clusters and two sets of double stars. Herschel became
interested in seeking to delineate the shape of the galaxy while
searching for star clusters and nebulae. Herschel assumed that
his telescope could reach to the edge of the universe, so he
considered that his resulting map traced the entire cosmos. By
1818, as improvements to his telescopes simply continued to
bring more and more distant stars into view, Herschel became
convinced that his map represented only a limited view of the
universe, which he decided was “fathomless.”
BibrefsMitchel1861
89
Section 10: The First Map of the Galaxy
Smyth, William Henry.
A cycle of celestial objects. London: J. W. Parker, 1844.
Not having any proof to the contrary, Herschel assumed that
our sun was quite central in the galaxy. Philosophically, this was
a return to the Copernican cosmos, in which the stars were
distributed around the sun in equal measure, making our solar
system the focus of the universe. Herschel restored our sun’s
special place, plucking it out of the infinite plurality of worlds
that had no center. As a coda beyond the span of this exhibit, it
is interesting to note that in 1918 it was discovered that our sun
was not near the center of the galaxy but further out in its
spiral. Our sun lost its unique status, but we learned in 1925
that as it heads toward Hercules as Herschel had discovered, it
also joins the other stars in a fascinating journey all the way
around the center of our Milky Way Galaxy, much as Thomas
Wright and Immanuel Kant had imagined.
BibrefsSmyth1844
90
Coda:
Multiple Galaxies Confirmed
In 1918, observations proved that the sun was not
centrally located in the galaxy, but further toward the
system's rim. Our sun lost its special place, but in 1925
we gained a new understanding of its motion. It was
discovered that together with the other stars, our sun
moves in a general motion around the center of the
galaxy, much as Wright, and especially Kant, had
imagined. In that same year, another suggestion of those
eighteenth-century authors was proven: multiple
galaxies exist beyond our own.
BibrefsCoda
Table of Contents
Thomas Wright. An original theory or new hypothesis of the universe, 1750.
91
Bibliography of Works Exhibited
Apian, Peter.
Cosmographia. Antwerp: Bontio, 1550.
Arago, Francois.
Popular astronomy. London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1855. v.
1.
Aristotle (384-322 BCE).
Aristotelis Stagiritae De coelo… Cum Averrois ... variis in eosdem commentariis.
Venice: Iuntas, 1550.
Aristotle (384-322 BCE).
Opera. Venice: Aldus Manutius, 1495.
Barin, Théodore.
Le monde naissant. Utrecht: Pour la Compagnie des Libraires, 1686.
Beati, Gabriele.
Sphaera triplex … Rome: Typis Varesij, 1662.
Blaue, Johannes.
Atlas maior, siue, Cosmographia Blauiana. v.1. Amsterdam: Labore &
sumptibus Ioannis Blaeu, 1662.
Bode, Johann Elert.
Allgemeine Betrachtungen über das Weltgebäude. Berlin: [s.n.], 1812.
Bode, Johann Elert.
Vorstellung der Gestirne auf XXXIV Kupfertafeln nach der Pariser Ausgabe des
Flamsteadschen Himmelsatlas. Berlin und Stralsand: Bey Gottlieb August
Lange, 1782 .
Bonnycastle, John.
An introduction to astronomy. London: Printed for J. Johnson, 1787.
Brahe, Tycho. Learned: Tico Brahæ, his astronomicall coniectur of the new and
much admired [star]. London: by B[ernard] A[lsop] and T[homas F[awcet] for
Michaell [Sparks] and Samuell Nealand, 1632.
Bruno, Giordano.
De triplici minimo et mensura… Frankfurt: Apud Ioannem Wechelum & Petrum
Fischerum , 1591.
Cellarius, Andreas.
Harmonia macrocosmica, sev Atlas universalis et nouus. Amsterdam: apud
Joannem Janssonium, 1661
Clavius, Christoph.
In sphaeram Ioannis de Sacro Bosco commentaries. Rome: Helianum, 1570.
Clavius, Christoph.
Operum mathematicorum . Mainz: sumptibus Antonii Hierat; Excudebat
Reinhardus Eltz, 1611.
Descartes, Rene.
Principia philosophia. Amsterdam: Apud Ludovicum Elzevirium, 1644
Descartes, Rene.
Principia philosophia. Amstelodami: Apud Ludovicum & Danielem Elzevirios,
1656.
Digges, Leonard.
A prognostication everlastinge of right good effect, with additions by his sonne
Thomas. London: by the widow Orwin, 1596.
Doppelmayr, Johann.
Atlas coelestis. Nuremberg: sumpt. Heredum Homannianorum, 1742.
Euler, Leonhard.
Theoria motuum planetarum et cometarum. Berlin: Sumtibus Ambrosii Haude,
1744.
92
Fine, Oronce.
De mundi sphaera. Paris: Colinaei, 1542.
Flammarion, Camille.
L'atmosphère météorologie populaire. Paris : Librairie Hachette et cie., 1888.
Flamsteed, John.
Atlas céleste. Paris, Chez F.G. Deschamps [et chez] l'auteur, 1776.
Fludd, Robert.
Utriusque cosmi maioris scilicet et minoris metaphysica, physica atque technica
historia. Oppenheim: Aere Johan-Theodori de Bry ; typis Hieronymi Galleri,
1617.
Fontenelle, M. de Bernard Le Bovier.
Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes. Paris ; Lyon: Chez T. Amaulry, 1686.
Fontenelle, M. de Bernard Le Bovier.
Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes. Amsterdam: Chez Pierre Mortier.. 1701.
Gallucci, Giovanni Paolo.
Theatrum mundi, et temporis. Venice: Apud Ioannem Baptistam Somascum,
1588.
Gassendi, Pierre.
Institutio astronomica. London: Typis Jacobi Flesher; Prostant apud
Gulielmum Morden, 1653.
Gilbert, William.
De magnete. Londini :Excudebat Petrus Short, 1600.
Gilbert, William.
De mundo nostro sublunari philosophia nova. Amsterdam: apud L. Elzevirium
1651.
Guericke, Otto von.
Experimenta nova (ut vocantur) magdeburgica de vacuo spatio primum.
Amsterdam: apud Joannem Janssonium a Waesberge, 1672.
Herschel, William.
“On the Proper Motion of the Sun and Solar System” Philosophical Transactions
73:247-283 (January 1, 1783).
Herschel, William.
“On the Construction of the Heavens”Philosophical Transactions 75:213-266.
(January 1, 1785).
Hevelius, Johannes.
Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia. Gedani: typis J.-Z. Stollii, 1690.
Horrebow, Peder.
Basis astronomiae; sive, Astronomiae pars mechanica. Havniae : Apud viduam
beati Hieron. Christiani Paulli, 1735.
Huygens, Christiaan.
The Celestial Worlds Discover'd. London: Printed for Timothy Childe, 1698.
Huygens, Christaan.
Cosmotheoros, eller Werlds Beskådare. Upsala : Tryckt på egen bekostnad af
Johan Edman, Kongl. Acad. Boltryctare, 1774.
Huygens, Christaan.
Opera varia. Lugduni Batavorum : Apud Janssonios Vander Aa, 1724. Vol. 1.
(portrait)
Hyginus
De mundi et sphere. Venice: Sessa, 1512.
Jamieson, Alexander.
A celestial atlas. London : Published by G. & W.B. Whittaker..., T. Cadell..., and N.
Hailes..., 1822.
Johnston, Alexander Keith.
Atlas of astronomy. Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons,
1855.
93
Kant, Immanuel.
Allgemeine geschichte und theorie des himmels. Zeitz : Bei Wilhelm Webel,
1798.
Kepler, Johann.
Astronomia nova. [Heidelberg : G. Voegelinus], 1609.
Kepler, Johannes.
De cometis libelli tres. Augsburg: Typis Andreae Apergeri, 1619.
Kepler, Johannes.
De stella nova in pede Serpentarii. Prague: Typis Pauli Sessii; impensis authoris
1606.
Kircher, Athanasius.
Iter extaticum coeleste . Würzburg: sumptibus Joh. And. & Wolffg. Jun.
Endterorum haeredibus, prostat Norimbergae apud eosdem, 1660.
Lipstorp, Daniel.
Specimina philosophiae Cartesianae. Quibus accredit ijusdem authoris
Copernicus redivivus.
Leiden: apud Johannem & Danielem Elsevier. 1653.
Mallement, Claude.
L'ouvrage de la creation. Paris : Chez la veuve Claude Thiboust et Pierre
Esclassan, 1679.
Maupertuis, Pierre.
Discours sur les differentes figures des astres. Paris: Chez G. Martin, JeanBaptiste Coignard, & les Freres Guerin, 1742.
Mitchel, Ormsby M.
The planetary and stellar worlds. London: T. Nelson and Sons...,1861 .
Newton, Isaac.
The mathematical principles of natural philosophy.
London: Printed for Benjamin Motte, 1729 (both vols.).
Pemberton , Henry.
A view of Sir Isaac Newton's philosophy.
Printed by S. Palmer, 1728.
Peurbach, Georg von.
Theoricae novae planetarum.
Basel: Henric petrina, 1573.
Plato (427-347 BCE).
Timaeus. Paris: Badius Ascencius, 1520.
Ptolemy (100-170 CE).
Almagestum. Venice: Petrus Liechtenstein, 1515.
Regiomontanus (1436-1476).
Epytoma in Almagestu Ptolemei.
Venice: Landoia, 1496.
Sacrobosco, Johannes.
De sphaera. Venice: Ratdolt, 1482.
Sacrobosco, Johannes.
Sphaera mundi. Venice: Scoti, 1490.
Meissner, August Gottlieb.
Astronomischer Hand-Atlas zu Rüdigers Kenntniss des Himmels. Leipzig : bey
Siegfried Lebrecht Crusius, 1805.
Scheiner, Christoph.
Disquisitiones mathematicae de controversiis et novitatibus astronomicis.
Ingolstadt: Ex typographeo Ederiano apud Elisabetham Angermariam, 1614.
Mesmes, Jean Pierre de.
Les institutions astronomiques. Paris: De l'imprimerie de Michel de Vascosan,
1557.
Scheiner, Christoph.
Rosa Ursina siue Sol. Bracciani: Apud Andream Phaeum Typographum
Ducalem, 1630.
94
Scheuchzer, Johann.
Phisica sacra. Augsburg: [s.n.], 1734.
Schreckenfuchs, Erasmus Oswald.
Commentaria, in Nouas theoricas planetarum Georgii Purbachii. Basel: Petri,
1556.
Seller, John.
Atlas coelestis. London: Sold by Ier: Seller & Cha: Price at [the] Hermitage &
Phil: Lea at [the] Atlas & Hercules in Cheapside, 1700.
Smyth, William Henry.
A cycle of celestial objects. London: J. W. Parker, 1844.
Wilkins, John.
A discourse concerning a new world & another planet. London: Printed by Iohn
Norton for Iohn Maynard, 1640.
Wing, Vincent.
Harmonicon coeleste : or, The coelestiall harmony of the visible world. London:
Printed by Robert Leybourn, for the Company of Stationers, 1651.
Wright, Thomas.
Clavis coelestis. London: Printed for the Author; and sold by E. Cave [et al],
1742.
Wright, Thomas.
An Original Theory…of the Universe…solving…the general phaenomena of the
visible creation and particularly the Via Lactea. London: Printed for the author,
1750.
Zahn, Johann.
Specula physico-mathematico-historica notabilium ac mirabilium sciendorum.
Nuremberg: sumptibus Joannis Christophori Lochner, 1696.
Thinking Outside the Sphere
Bibliographical References from Secondary Sources, with Notes and Quotations
Authors/dates of the rare works exhibited are in bold, followed by the secondary
sources, notes, and quotations relating to the exhibit catalog text.
Section 1: The Ancient Universe
Plato 1520
Back to catalog entry Plato1520
The starry sphere controlled the motion of the planets:
Plato. Timaeus. Trans. Benjamin Jowett. The Dialogues of Plato. New York:
Random House, 1937. 2 vols. (Jowett 2: 17-18). Plato wrote that the Creator
“gave dominion to the motion of the same.” While Plato proposes in Timaeus that
the “circle of the same” formed the sphere of the stars, the “circle of the diverse”
was divided into the circles or orbits of the planets; he does not describe the
planets as affixed to spheres.
Myth of Er: Plato. Republic, Book X. (Jowett 1: 874). In contrast to the sphere of
stars described in Plato’s rational cosmological work Timaeus, his fanciful tale of Er
describes the stars as forming a hemisphere. Inside it, each planet was attached
to its own hemisphere, each inside the other, likened in the tale to a set of vessels.
Plato in this imaginary work thus introduced a nested model of the universe.
Aristotle established a nested spheres model (see entry for Aristotle 1495 work
below), presenting a stellar sphere as in Plato’s Timaeus, but asserting that the
planets resided in spheres within it.
Relevant quotations:
Plato on the spherical form of the universe and circular motion
The Creator… “made the world in the form of a globe… having its
extremes in every direction equidistant from the centre, the most
perfect and the most like itself of all figures; for he considered that
the like is infinitely fairer than the unlike... and he made the
universe a circle moving in a circle.” Timaeus (Jowett 2: 16).
Plato on the creation of the sphere of the stars The Creator
compounded all of the elements and then divided the mixture
“lengthways into two parts, which he joined to one another at the
95
centre like the letter X, and bent them into circular form,”
connecting the ends together to form an inner circle and an outer
circle. The outer circle, which had dominion over the motion of
the inner one, formed the sphere of the stars. The inner circle “he
divided in six places and made seven unequal circles having their
intervals in ratios of two and three…; and three *the Sun, Mercury,
and Venus] he made to move with equal swiftness, and the
remaining four [the Moon, Saturn, Mars and Jupiter] to move with
unequal swiftness.” Timaeus (Jowett 2: 17-18).
Plato on the stars The Creator fashioned the stars “out of fire, that
they might be the brightest of all things and fairest to behold, and
he fashioned them after the likeness of the universe in the figure
of a circle… distributing them over the whole circumference of
heaven, which was to be a true cosmos or glorious world spangled
with them all over.” Timaeus (Jowett 2: 21).
Aristotle 1495
Back to catalog entry Aristotle1495
The nested spheres model; the necessity of the spherical shape of the universe:
Aristotle wrote: “The shape of the heaven is of necessity spherical…Now the first
figure [the sphere] belongs to the first body, and the first body is that at the
farthest circumference *the sphere of the stars+… The same then will be true of
the body continuous with it: for that which is continuous with the spherical is
spherical. The same again holds of the bodies between these and the centre [the
earth]. Bodies which are bounded by the spherical and in contact with it must be,
as wholes, spherical; and the bodies below the sphere of the planets are
contiguous with the sphere above them. The sphere then will be spherical
throughout; for every body within it is contiguous and continuous with spheres.”
Aristotle. “On the Heavens.” Trans. W. D. Ross. Great Books of the Western World.
Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: Wm. Benton, Encyclopedia Britannica,
1952. (On the Heavens 2.4.286b,10-287a,10).
Relevant quotations:
Aristotle accounted for the appearance of the orbits of the planets
from earth, including retrograde motion, by providing more spheres
than planets: “That the movements are more numerous than the
bodies that are moved is evident…; for each of the planets has more
than one movement.” (Metaphysics 12.8.1073b,7-10).
Aristotle assigned the number of spheres required for the planets,
establishing the foundation on which Ptolemy would build his
sophisticated system. Aristotle first mentioned the system of
Eudoxus and the contributions of others. He then wrote: “But it is
necessary, if all the spheres combined are to explain the observed
facts, that for each of the planets there should be other spheres…
which counteract those already mentioned and bring back to the
same position the outermost sphere of the stars… for only thus can
all the forces at work produce the observed motion of the planets.
Since the spheres involved in the movement of the planets
themselves are eight for Saturn and Jupiter and twenty-five for the
others” and additional spheres are required to counteract various
motions, “therefore the number of all the spheres, both those which
move the planets and those which counteract these, will be fifty-five.
And if one were not to add [the spheres of Callippus], the whole set
of spheres will be forty-seven in number.” (Metaphysics
12.8.1074a,1-14).
Opening page of Aristotle’s On the Heavens: Cahill, Hugh. "Every Person
Naturally Seeks to Know” Rare Books Collection, Kings College, London, an online
exhibition of books on ancient Greek science and medicine from the Foyle Special
Collections Library. August 25, 2005. Web. 2009.
http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/iss/library/speccoll/exhibitions/gsci/ast.html
Aristotle 1550
Back to catalog entry Aristotle1550
The motion of the sphere of stars… God as final cause:
Aristotle. “Metaphysics” Trans. W. D. Ross. Great Books of the Western World. Ed.
Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: Wm. Benton, Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952.
(Metaphysics 12.7.1072b,9). Aristotle wrote: “...motion in a circle is the first
kind of spatial motion, and this the first mover produces.”
Heavenly source of rotation of the sphere of stars was associated with its shape:
Aristotle. “On the Heavens.” Trans. W. D. Ross. Great Books of the Western World.
96
Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins, 1952:
“The perfect is naturally prior to the imperfect, and the circle is a perfect thing…”
(On the Heavens 1.2.269a,20)
“The activity of God is immortality, i.e. eternal life. Therefore the movement of
that which is divine must be eternal. But such is the heaven, viz. a divine body,
and for that reason to it is given the circular body whose nature it is to move
always in a circle...” (On the Heavens 2.3.286a,10);
“Let us consider generally which shape is primary among planes and solids alike…
The sphere is among solids what the circle is among plane figures… Alone among
solids [geometers] leave the sphere undivided, as not possessing more than one
surface …the sphere is first of solid figures… It follows that the body which
revolves with a circular movement must be spherical.” (On the Heavens
2.4.286b,12-287a,5).
Relevant quotation
Aristotle on the role of the sphere of the fixed stars in the
nested spheres model:
“In thinking of the life and moving principal of the several
heavens one must regard the first [outermost sphere] as far
superior to the others. Such a superiority would be reasonable.
For this single first motion has to move many of the divine
bodies [planets], while the numerous other motions move only
one each since each planet moves with a variety of motions.”
(On the Heavens 2.12.292b,30).
Regiomontanus 1496
Back to catalog entry Regiomontanus1496
Ptolemy revolutionized astronomy:
Gingerich, Owen. The Eye of Heaven: Ptolemy, Copernicus, Kepler. New York:
American Institute of Physics, 1993. 7-8. Gingerich notes that with his Almagest,
“Ptolemy’s goal is nothing less than the calculation of planetary positions at any
time—past, present, or future.”
Toomer, G. J., transl. Ptolemy’s Almagest. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1984. 37-40;
321-327; 419-420. Ptolemy generally reiterates the traditional (Aristotelian)
sphere of the stars. He then introduces his system for the planets, giving
assurance “that all their apparent anomalies can be represented by uniform
circular motions.”
Webb, Stephen. Measuring the Universe: the Cosmological Distance Ladder.
Chichester, UK: Praxis Publishing, 1999. 34-35. In his Planetary Hypothesis (not
the Almagest), Ptolemy provided the first scientific estimate of the distance from
earth to the sphere of the fixed stars, interpreted by Webb as about 60 million
miles.
Van Helden, Albert. Measuring the Universe: Cosmic Dimensions from Aristarchus
to Halley. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985. 15, 20-24. Includes an
excellent comparison of the general order of the planets given in the Almagest
and the defined nested orbits of the planets described in the Planetary
Hypothesis.
On Regiomontanus and Peurbach:
O'Connor, J. J. and E. F. Robertson. Georg Peurbach. School of Mathematics and
Statistics, University of St. Andrews, Scotland. August 2006. Web. 2009.
http://www.gap-system.org/~history/Biographies/Peurbach.html
Provides biographies of Peurbach and Regiomontanus and describes the joint
project of preparing the exhibited work of Ptolemy’s Almagest.
Ptolemy 1515
Back to catalog entry Ptolemy1515
Ptolemy diverged from Aristotle’s ideal system…the earth was not the precise
center:
Gingerich, Owen. The Eye of Heaven: Ptolemy, Copernicus, Kepler. New York:
American Institute of Physics, 1993. 8-9; 139-145.
Ptolemy’ star catalog printed for the first time in this edition of Almagest:
Ashworth, William B. “Out of This World: The Golden Age of the Celestial Atlas”
Linda Hall Library. 2007. Web. 2009.
http://www.lindahall.org/events_exhib/exhibit/exhibits/stars/pto.htm
Ptolemy 1515 is the second entry in this online exhibit.
97
Section 2: The Enduring Earth-Centered System
Peurbach 1573
Back to catalog entry Peurbach1573
On Apollonius of Perga and Hipparchus:
[Note: Ptolemy inherited seeds of the ideas of the epicycle/deferent and of orbits
not centered on earth from these ancient astronomers.]
Gingerich, Owen. The Eye of Heaven: Ptolemy, Copernicus, Kepler. New York:
American Institute of Physics, 1993. 7-8.
Webb, Stephen. Measuring the Universe: the Cosmological Distance Ladder.
Chichester, UK: Praxis Publishing, 1999. 34-35.
On Ptolemy’s astronomical system:
Toomer, G. J., transl. Ptolemy’s Almagest. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1984. 420.
Toomer notes that “In his Planetary Hypothesis [see below] Ptolemy proposes a
system in which the spheres of the planets are contiguous.”
Goldstein, Bernard R. “The Arabic version of Ptolemy’s Planetary Hypothesis.”
Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 2nd ser. 57. 4 (1967): 3-12.
Book I, part 2 of Ptolemy’s Planetary Hypothesis includes his estimate of the
distance to the sphere of stars, and establishes absolute distances for the planets
that leave no space between their nested orbits, for example: “The distances of
the three remaining planets may be determined without difficulty from the
nesting of the spheres, where the least distance of a sphere is considered equal to
the greatest distance of the sphere below it.”
Note: While Ptolemy retained Aristotle’s sphere of stars, scholars do not interpret
Ptolemy’s planetary spheres as complete spheres; Ptolemy refers to “sawn
portions” of spheres, or “tambourines.” *Peter Barker. Personal interview. 2009].
Barker, Peter. “Copernicus and the Critics of Ptolemy.” Journal for the History of
Astronomy, (Nov.1999): 343-344. Web. 2009. Regarding the nature of Ptolemy’s
spheres in the Planetary Hypothesis, Barker describes nested concentric shells
“rotating about axes that were diameters” and notes that the shells were later
called orbs.
Peurbach emphasized the solid nature of the spheres:
O'Connor, J. J. and E. F. Robertson. Georg Peurbach. School of Mathematics and
Statistics, University of St. Andrews, Scotland. August 2006. Web. 2009.
http://www.gap-system.org/~history/Biographies/Peurbach.html
On the epicycle “immersed in the depth” of its orb, etc.:
Aiton, E. J. “Peurbach’s Theoricae novae planetarum.” Osiris 2nd series. 3 (1987):
12, 15.
Sacro Bosco 1482
Back to catalog entry Sacrobosco1482
On this Ratdolt edition of Sacro Bosco:
Gingerich, Owen. “Sacrobosco Illustrated.” Between Demonstration and
Imagination: Essays in the History of Science and Philosophy Presented to John D.
North. Ed. Lodi Nauta and Arjo Banderjagt. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill, 1999. 211.
Schreckenfuchs 1556
General info/no refs
Sacro Bosco 1490
General info/no refs
Hyginus 1512
Back to catalog entry Hyginus1512
This work was usually called the Poeticon Astronomicon:
Ashworth, William B. “Out of This World: The Golden Age of the Celestial Atlas”
Linda Hall Library. 2007. Web. 2009.
http://www.lindahall.org/events_exhib/exhibit/exhibits/stars/hygb.htm
Hyginus 1512 is the fourth entry in this online exhibit.
Fine, Oronce 1542
Back to catalog entry Fine1542
Among the works he edited were Peurbach’s:
Thorndike, Lynn. A History of Magic and Experimental Science. New York:
Columbia University Press, 1941. 8 vols. (Thorndike V: The Sixteenth Century)
284-291.
Among the works he edited were… Apian’s:
Short, John R. Making Space: Revisioning the World 1475-1600. Syracuse
University Press, 2004. 42-44. Web (Google Books, accessed 2009).
98
Fine had published a book about…an equatorium:
O’Connor, J. J. and E.F. Robertson. Oronce Fine. School of Mathematics and
Statistics, University of St. Andrews, Scotland.September 2005. Web. 2009.
http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Fine.html
Back to catalog entry Scheiner1614
On Scheiner’s image showing why the earth cannot rotate:
Ashworth, William B. “Iconography of a new physics.” History and Technology 4.2
(1987): 271-272.
Gassendi 1653
Apian 1550
General info/no refs
Fludd 1617
Scheiner 1614
Back to catalog entry Fludd1617
Back to catalog entry Gassendi1653
On Gassendi and the sun-centered system:
Hagen, John. "Pierre Gassendi." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 6. New York:
Robert Appleton Company, 1909. Web. 2009.
<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06391b.htm>.
On the angelic orders:
Godwin, Joscelyn. Robert Fludd: Hermetic philosopher and surveyor of two worlds.
London: Thames and Hudson, 1979. 21, 22.
“Christian angelic hierarchy.” Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia
Foundation, Inc. [n.d.] Web. 2009.
Gassendi on atomism, magnetism, and moving particles:
Donahue, William. The Dissolution of the Celestial Spheres 1595-1650. New York:
Arno Press, 1981. 273-275.
Galucci 1588
Lipstorp 1650
General info/no refs.
Back to catalog entry Lipstorp1653
(Bound with Descartes' Opera, 1650; the illustration appears in separately
paginated work at end: Copernicus Redivivus. 1653).
Clavius 1570
Back to catalog entry Clavius1570
On the influence of Clavius on Jesuit scholarship:
Lattis, James M. Between Copernicus and Galileo: Christoph Clavius and the
collapse of Ptolemaic cosmology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. 217219.
On Clavius as one of few astronomers likely to have understood the
mathematics of Copernicus:
Gingerich, Owen. The Eye of Heaven: Ptolemy, Copernicus, Kepler. New York:
American Institute of Physics, 1993. 235.
Lipstorp subscribed to the universal system of Descartes:
Donahue, William. The Dissolution of the Celestial Spheres 1595-1650. NY: Arno
Press, 1981. 277; 288-289.
On the number of heavens:
Magruder, Kerry V. “Jesuit Science After Galileo: The Cosmology of Gabriele
Beati.” Centaurus. 51. 3 (August 2009): 195-196.
Clavius 1611
Back to catalog entry Clavius1611
Regarding biblical images on the title page:
Remmert, Volker. “Picturing Jesuit anti-Copernican Consensus: astronomy and
biblical exegesis in the engraved title-page of Clavius’ Opera mathematica.”
Jesuits II: Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts, 1540-1773. Toronto: University of
Toronto Press. 2006. 301-304.
Section 3: The Sun Takes Center Stage
Cellarius 1661
Back to catalog entry Cellarius1661
On the conception of the atlas by the printer Janson:
Gent, Robert Harry van. The finest atlas of the heavens. [Harmonia macrocosmica
of 1660; Facsimile with introduction]. Hong Kong; Los Angeles: Taschen, 2006. 9;
239.
99
Section 4: The Spheres of the Planets Shatter
Quotes from Copernicus:
Koyre. From the closed world to the infinite universe. Baltimore: The Johns
Hopkins Press, 1957. 31-33. The quote “But in the center…the whole of it”
continues: “Therefore it is not improperly that some people call it the lamp of the
world… Thus, assuredly, as residing in the royal see *seat or throne+ the Sun
governs the surrounding family of stars.”
Scheuchzer 1734
Back to catalog entry Wing1651
General info on Wing:
Applebaum, Wilbur. “Vincent Wing.” Dictionary of Scientific Biography. 1976.
Wright 1742
Back to catalog entry Brahe1632
Quote from Brahe, and his discovery of the new star:
Hirshfeld, Alan. Parallax: the Race to Measure the Cosmos. New York: W.H.
Freeman, 2001. 75;
81-82.
Aristotle had taught that no changes occurred in the realm of the stars and
planets:
Aristotle wrote that we “see nothing coming to be spontaneously in the heavens”
(Physics II.4.196b, 1-4).
General info/no refs.
Wing 1651
Brahe 1632
Back to catalog entry Wright1742
Ancient authors quoted by Copernicus:
Gingerich, Owen. The Eye of heaven: Ptolemy, Copernicus, Kepler. New York:
American Institute of Physics, 1993. 188.
Relevant quotation:
Plato on the creation of the sun (in the earth-centered universe):
“That there might be some visible measure of *the planets’+ relative
swiftness and slowness as they proceeded in their eight courses, God
lighted a fire, which we now call the sun, in the second from the
earth of these orbits, that it might give light to the whole of heaven,
and that the *planets+ might participate in number… Thus, then, and
for this reason the night and the day were created.”
Timaeus (Jowett 2:20)
Aristotle on the incorruptibility of the heavens:
Aristotle wrote: “If the body which moves with a circular motion cannot admit of
increase or diminution, it is reasonable to suppose that it is also unalterable...So
far as our inherited records reach, no change appears to have taken place either in
the whole scheme of the outermost heaven [the sphere of the fixed stars] or in
any of its proper parts.” Aristotle adds that the very word aither (the medium in
which the stars reside) means runs always for an eternity of time, and that this
word, “handed down from our distant ancestors even to our own day” supports
the eternal, unchanging nature of the sphere of the fixed stars. (On the Heavens
1.3.270a, 33- 270b, 24)
Aristotelian doctrine on unchanging realm of stars can be recognized in
Ptolemy’s Almagest:
Toomer, G. J., transl. Ptolemy’s Almagest. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1984. 321322.
Blaue 1662
Back to catalog entry Blaue1662
On Brahe’s observatory, the discovery of the comet, and its location in the
celestial realm: Hirshfeld, Alan. Parallax: the Race to Measure the Cosmos. New
York: W.H. Freeman, 2001. 85; 88-89.
See sections 5-7 for quotes regarding other stars as suns
That the comet convinced Brahe of the fluidity of heavens:
Grant, Edward. Planets, Stars, and Orbs: the Medieval Cosmos, 1200-1687.
Cambridge University Press, 1994. 347-353.
100
University Press, 1992. 379.
Tycho’s universal system precluded material celestial spheres:
The spheres of Mars and the sun would intersect. Lattis, James M. Between
Copernicus and Galileo: Christoph Clavius and the Collapse of Ptolemaic
Cosmology. The University of Chicago Press, 1994. 211.
Quote by Brahe from his treatise:
Translated by Bruce Bradley, Librarian for the History of Science, Linda Hall Library,
from Dreyer, J.L.E. (ed.) Opera Omnia (1913-29), vol. 4 (De mundi aetherei). 222.
Kepler 1606
Back to catalog entry Kepler1606
A new star in Cygnus was discovered by Blaeu:
Frommert, Hartmut . “Early variable star discoverers.” Spider’s Homepage. SEDS
(Students for the Exploration and Development of Space). 1995. Web. 2009.
http://seds.org/~spider/spider/Vars/Add/var-dis.html
Kepler’s new star in the constellation Opiuchus:
Ashworth, William B. “Out of This World: The Golden Age of the Celestial Atlas”
Linda Hall Library. 2007. Web. 2009.
http://www.lindahall.org/events_exhib/exhibit/exhibits/stars/kep.htm
Kepler 1606 is the 11th entry in this online exhibit.
Kepler 1619
General info/no refs.
Beati 1662
On Beati’s cosmos:
Magruder, Kerry V. “Jesuit Science After Galileo: the Cosmology of Gabriele
Beati.” Centaurus 51. 3 (August 2009): cosmos 189-212; cosmos and Tychonic
system 204; cosmos and scripture 196-198.
On Beati’s work as representing the dissolution of the planetary spheres:
Ashworth, William B. “Iconography of a New Physics.” History and Technology 4.2
(1987): 267-268.
On Clavius’ opposition to fluid heavens:
Specifically the reference to “fish in the sea or birds in the air”
Lattis, James M. Between Copernicus and Galileo: Christoph Clavius and the
Collapse of Ptolemaic Cosmology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. 103.
The quote from Aristotle is provided in full at the end of the bibliographical
references for Section 1. (Metaphysics 12.8.1074a,1-14).
Kepler estimated the extent of the sphere of the fixed stars:
Taton, Rene and Curtis Wilson. Planetary astronomy from the Renaissance to the
rise of astrophysics. Cambridge University Press, 1989. (Part A: Tycho Brahe to
Newton). 74.
Note: Kepler suggested that the sun is in the middle of the universe; other stars
are symmetrically arranged around it. See Donahue, William H. The Dissolution of
the Celestial Spheres: 1595-1650. New York: Arno Press, 1981. 96.
Note: Kepler’s stellar sphere was only a few miles in thickness. See Van Helden,
Albert. Measuring the Universe: Cosmic Dimensions from Aristarchus to Halley.
The University of Chicago Press, 1985. 88.
Kepler’s rejection of planetary spheres; quote about Brahe:
Donahue, William H. Johannes Kepler: New Astronomy. Cambridge: Cambridge
Back to catalog entry Beati1662
Section 5: The Sphere of Fixed Stars Dissolves
Note: several authors who provided these early depictions of the stars dispersed
also supported the idea of the “plurality of worlds” (see quotes re: “stars as suns”
in this section, and section 7)
Bruno 1591
Back to catalog entry Bruno1591
On statement from trial:
Saiber, Arielle. “Ornamental Flourishes in Giordano Bruno’s Geometry.” Sixteenth
Century Journal 34. 3 (2003): 741.
The trilogy included De triplici minimo et mensura, De monade, and De immenso:
101
Gatti, Hilary. Giordano Bruno and Renaissance Science. Ithaca: Cornell University
Press, 1999. 29.
A source book of Euclidean proofs:
Saiber. 731.
On Bruno’s opinion that mathematics lacked vincoli, the bonds of love, that exist
between number, figure, form, divinity, and nature:
Saiber. 731; 742.
On the atom as infused with the divine:
Schettino, Ernesto. “The Necessity of the Minima in the Nolan Philosophy.”
Giordano Bruno, Philosopher of the Renaissance. Ed. Hilary Gatti. Hants, England:
Ashgate, 2002. 313; and Gatti, Hilary. Giordano Bruno and Renaissnce Science.
Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999. 134.
On the images as devices internal to the mind, symbolizing aspects of the atom:
Gatti. 1999. 164-166.
On the meaning of the three temple images:
Gatti. 1999. 164-173.
On the temple images (mens, intellectus, amor) as seals against the
mathematicians:
Yates, Frances A. Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition. University of
Chicago Press, 1964. 319.
On Bruno’s carving of the woodblocks:
Yates. 320.
Quote “Convince our minds of the infinite universe…”
Bruno, Giordano. On the Infinite Universe and Worlds. 1584. Trans. Dorothea
Waley Singer. New York: Schuman, 1950. (End of 5th dialogue, 12th argument) 377378.
Relevant quotation:
Bruno was an early and ardent advocate of multiple worlds,
viewing the stars as suns. For example, Bruno’s character
Philotheo suggests that space has no centre nor boundary [an
idea from Nicolas of Cusa], and that “there are in this space those
countless bodies such as our earth and other earths, our sun and
other suns, which all revolve within this infinite space… The earth
no more than any other world is at the center… and the same is
true of all other bodies.” (On the Infinite Universe and Worlds 2nd
dialogue, following fifth argument; Singer. 280).
Digges 1596
Back to catalog entry Digges1596
A few years before Bruno:
Johnson, Francis R. “The influence of Thomas Digges on the progress of modern
astronomy in XVIth century England.” Osiris 1 (1936): 391.
Note: The Digges image first appeared in the 1576 edition of his father’s almanac,
and Bruno’s Le Cena de le Ceneri (his first exposition on infinite worlds) did not
appear until 1584.
Digges provided the first English translation of Copernicus:
Johnson. 391
Digges presented the infinite universe as part of Copernicus’ system:
Johnson. 404.
Digges was educated by John Dee:
Johnson. 398-399.
Dee’s library:
“John Dee (Mathematician).” Absolute Astronomy Encyclopedia. n.d. Web. 2009.
The article states: “In his lifetime Dee amassed the largest library in England and
one of the largest in Europe… Dee's library, a center of learning outside the
universities, became the greatest in England and attracted many scholars.”
Dee owned a copy of Lucretius:
French, Peter T. John Dee: The World of an Elizabethan Magus. NY: Routledge,
102
1972 (reprinted 2002). 46.
Relevant quotations:
Note: The stars had been perceived as limited to a sphere chiefly
because the stellar sphere was thought to rotate. Digges’ translation
of Copernicus made it clear that in that system, the sphere of the
stars no longer moved. If it did not move, Digges understood that it
could extend up without limit. He encouraged the idea that the stars
were at varying distances from earth.
The text on the plate: “This orbe of starres fixed infinitely up
extendeth hit self in altitude sphericallye, and therefore immovable /
The palace of foelicitye garnished with perpetuall shininge glorious
lightes innumerable, farr excelling our sonne both in quantitye and
qualitye ; the very court of coelestiall angels, devoid of greefe and
replenished with perfite endless joye; the habitacle for the elect.”
Gilbert 1651
Back to catalog entry Gilbert1651
Several ideas in De magnete are expanded upon in this later publication:
Kelly, Sister Suzanne. The De Mundo of William Gilbert. Amsterdam: Menno
Hertzberger & Co., 1965. 25.
Note: Kelly writes that the “Physiologiae… section *first two books of De mundo]
was an expansion of the cosmology in the sixth book of De magnete.”
Kelly. 58.
Note: Kelly writes that In De magnete, Gilbert “denied the existence of the
crystalline spheres…, posited the void and effluvia surrounding each star and
planet, scattered the fixed stars at varying distances from the Earth… but only in
De mundo did he explain these ideas in detail.”
Quotes from De magnete:
Gilbert, William. On the Loadstone. Trans. P. Fleury Mottelay. Baltimore: Peabody
Institute Library, 1892 [reprinted 1938]. 319-320.
Koyré, Alexandre. From the closed world to the infinite universe. Baltimore: The
Johns Hopkins Press, 1957. 55-57.
Note: After mentioning that Gilbert accepted the rotation of the earth, Koyre
includes Gilbert’s quote *from Book VI, chapter III of De magnete] denying
adamantine spheres and denying the sphere of the fixed stars, and extends the
quote to include the passage: “How immeasurable then must be the space which
stretches to those remotest of the fixed stars! How vast and immense the depth
of that imaginary sphere!”
Kircher 1660
Back to catalog entry Kircher1660
On the influence of Kircher:
Fletcher, John E. “Astronomy in the Life and Correspondence of Athanasius
Kircher.” Isis 61.1. 206 (1970): 52-53. Beyond the great philosopher’s
correspondence, Fletcher also notes that in Rome, “many visited Father Kircher.”
On the Iter narrative:
Fletcher. 58;
Note: reference to stars as suns: “The Iter exstaticum coeleste…explicitly
characterized the fixed stars as suns with encircling planets, although it denied
inhabitants even to the planets of our solar system…” (Dick, Steven J. Plurality of
Worlds. Cambridge University Press, 1982. 116).
Guericke 1672
Back to catalog entry Guericke1672
Note: Guericke received a copy of Kircher’s Iter (1660; see entry above) and it
inspired him to expand his Experimenta Nova to include a physical astronomical
treatise:
Volk, O. “Remarks about the History of Celestial Mechanics.” Celestial Mechanics
2. 3 (1970): 431.
On Guericke’s studies of air and space:
Van Helden, Albert. “Guericke, Otto von.” Galileo Project. Rice University. 1995.
Web. 2009. http://galileo.rice.edu/Catalog/NewFiles/guericke.html
This image includes, for the first time, real named stars in their proper places…:
Ashworth, William B. (Exhibit Advisor). Note to C. Rogers. February 2010.
103
Relevant quotes:
After quoting from Kircher’s work, Guericke asserts that the
stars are suns having their own satellites:
“It can be concluded from this that the fixed stars, which we
see, are suns and that among them there are some bodies,
invisible to us here on earth, which undergo a remarkable
variety of phases like our moon. These bodies are lighted by the
suns, as our moon and the other planets are, and must be
planets of these suns or solar bodies.” (Experimenta nova. 7.4;
The new (so-called) Magdeburg experiments of Otto von
Guericke / by Otto von Guericke. Trans. Margaret Glover Foley
Ames. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1994. 366.)
Mesmes 1557
Back to catalog entry Mesmes1557
Noted as one of the earliest French works providing a description of the
Copernican system:
Baumgartner, Frederic J. “Skepticism and French Interest in Copernicanism to
1630.” Journal for the History of Astronomy 17 (1986): 78.
The unusual inclusion of a comet or meteor in the sphere of the fixed stars:
As this work (published the year after the comet of 1556) predates Brahe’s new
star of 1572, earlier influences must be sought that support change in the stellar
sphere or heavenly realm. For example, Girolamo Cardano published works on
comets in 1550 and 1557 suggesting that they were between the moon and the
stars. (Donahue, William H. The Dissolution of the Celestial Spheres 1595-1650.
NY: Arno Press, 1981. 52; see also: Tabbitta Van Nouhuys. The age of two-faced
Janus: the Comets of 1577 and 1618. Leiden: Brill, 1998. 85. Web (Google Books).
Section 6: Motive Forces and the Stars
Zahn 1696
Back to catalog entry Zahn1696
Aristotle on the ultimate motive force and love:
Aristotle. “Metaphysics.” Trans. W.D. Ross. Great Books of the Western World. Ed.
Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: Wm. Benton, Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952.
(Metaphysics 12.7.1072b,3-9).
On fiat as motive force:
Donahue. Dissolution.197.
On fiat in the form of angels as motive force:
Donahue, William. The Dissolution of the Celestial Spheres 1595-1650. New York:
Arno Press, 1981. 191.
Grant, Edward. Planets, Stars, and Orbs: the Medieval Cosmos 1200-1687.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. 567-568.
On Zahn’s Specula physico:
Kanas, Nick. Star Maps: History, Artistry, and Cartography. Berlin; New York:
Springer, 2007. 167.
Gilbert 1600
Back to catalog entry Gilbert1600
Description of plate:
Gilbert. De Magnete 5.12; Thompson 206.
Quote “The centre of the magnetic virtues…”
Gilbert. De Magnete 2.27; Thompson 95.
Gilbert was an animist in the tradition of Plato:
Note: for example see the following passages:
Plato. Timaeus. Trans. Benjamin Jowett. The Dialogues of Plato. New York:
Random House, 1937. 2 vols. (Jowett 2: 15-16).
Gilbert. De Magnete. Trans. Silvanus P. Thompson. On the Magnet by William
Gilbert. (Reprint of 1900 ed.) New York: Basic Books, 1958. 209.
[see full quotes below under Relevant Quotations]
Additional quotes regarding the animist tradition:
Plato: “Intelligence could not be present in anything which was devoid of soul. For
which reason, when [the Creator] was framing the universe, he put intelligence in
soul, and soul in body.” Timaeus (Jowett 2:14)
104
Gilbert: “…nothing is excellent, nor precious, nor eminent, that hath not soul…
Therefore the bodies of the globes…had need of souls to be conjoined to them,
for else there were neither life… nor coherence, nor conactus, nor sympathia.” De
Magnete 5.12; Trans. P. Fleury Mottelay. William Gilbert …On the Loadstone…
1600. Baltimore: Peabody Institute Library, 1892 (reprinted 1938). 310.
On the “intelligent” behavior of magnets:
Gilbert. De Magnete. Trans. P. Fleury Mottelay. William Gilbert …On the
Loadstone… 1600. Baltimore: Peabody Institute Library, 1892 (reprinted 1938).
311-312.
[see full quote below under Relevant Quotations]
continues as follows: “…an unending action, quick, definite,
constant…, harmonious, through the whole mass of matter…
These movements… are not produced by thoughts or reasonings…
like human acts, which are… imperfect and indeterminate, *but
rather the acts of the globes have] in them reason, knowledge,
science, judgment, whence proceed acts positive and definite from
the very foundations and beginnings of the world [which] because
of the weakness of our soul, we cannot comprehend.” (De
Magnete 5.12; Mottelay 311-312)
Kepler 1609
Relevant quotations:
Plato on the soul of the universe: “Now to the animal which was to
comprehend all animals, that figure was suitable which
comprehends within itself all other figures. Wherefore he made
the world in the form of a globe… the Creator did not think it
necessary to bestow upon him hands: nor had he any need of feet,
nor of the whole apparatus of walking; but the movement suited
to his spherical form [circular motion] was assigned to him… And
as this circular movement required no feet, the universe was
created without legs and without feet… And in the centre he put
the soul, which he diffused throughout the body… and he made
the universe a circle moving in a circle, one and solitary, yet by
reason of its excellence able to converse with itself, and needing
no other friendship or acquaintance.” Timaeus (Jowett 2: 15-16)
Gilbert on the soul of the universe: “We consider that the whole
universe is animated, and that all the globes, all the stars, and also
the noble earth have been governed since the beginning by their
own appointed souls and have motives of self-conservation.”
Gilbert’s passage continues: “…organs *of the animate world+…are
not fashioned of flesh and blood as animals, or composed of
regular limbs. Nor can any organs be discerned or imagined by us
in any of the stars, the sun, or the planets.” (De Magnete 5.12;
Thompson 209)
Gilbert on the intelligent action of the magnetic soul quote
Back to catalog entry Kepler1609
Kepler applied Gilbert’s magnetism to the sun:
“By the demonstration of the Englishman William Gilbert, the earth itself is a big
magnet, and is said by the same author… to rotate once a day, just as I conjecture
about the sun… It is therefore plausible, since the earth moves the moon through
its species and is a magnetic body, while the sun moves the planets similarly
through an emitted species, that the sun is likewise a magnetic body.” Kepler.
Astronomia Nova 3.34.176; New Astronomy. Trans. William H. Donahue.
Cambridge University Press, 1992. 390-391.
[See also under Pemberton in this section for more on Kepler and magnetism].
Kepler presented an analogy, illustrated in this diagram:
This image appears in chapter 57 of Kepler’s Astronomia Nova. Kepler introduces
it by referring to an earlier mention of the analogy he is about to present: “We
shall be obliged once again to take up our oars which were introduced in chapter
39” *but the passage is actually in chapter 38+. Kepler. Astronomia Nova 4.57.270;
New Astronomy. Trans. William H. Donahue. 549.
In chapter 38, Kepler describes how ferrymen sometimes suspend a cable high
above a river and tether the boat to it with another rope, and that in this way, the
ferrymen can make “the skiffs go in circles, send them hither and thither, and play
a thousand tricks, without touching the bottom or the banks, but by the use of the
oar alone, directing the…flow of the river to their own ends.” Kepler. Astronomia
Nova 3.38.185; Donahue 405.
Kepler then applies this analogy to the diagram in chapter 57, which has the sun
at one focus within the circle. “Let there be a circular river CDE, FGH, and in it a
105
sailor who revolves his oar once in twice the periodic time of the planet, by an
inherent and perfectly uniform force…. Now the stream, flowing down upon the
oar at DE will push the ship down toward A, while at C it will push very little.”
“The impulse will be less at C than at F, since our river is weak at C and strong at
F” corresponding to the acceleration and deacceleration of the orbit of a planet.
Kepler. Astronomia Nova 4.57.270; Donahue 549-550.
by Empedocles, according to whom the universe is alternately in
motion and at rest—in motion, when Love is making the one out of
many, or Strife is making many out of one, and at rest in the
intermediate periods of time.” (Physica 8.1.250b,25)
Seller 1700
Descartes 1644
Back to catalog entry Descartes1644
Ginzburg, Vladimir B. Prime elements of ordinary matter. Boca Raton: Universal
Publishers, 2007 (2nd ed.) 24-27. On Anaximander’s vortex theory; as soon as
contrary qualities are manifest, they are reabsorbed into the uncreated; vortex
theory of Anaxagoras; Empedocles and tea leaves.
Quote “If some straws are floating…”
Descartes. Principia Philosophia 3.30; Trans. Valentine Rodger Miller. Principles of
Philosophy. London: Reidel, 1983. 96.
Description of plate: “If S, for example, is the Sun…”
Descartes 3.23; Miller 92-93.
Description of the origin of the movement of comets:
Descartes 3.126; Miller 155-163.
Relevant Quotations
Aristotle on the vortex: “Empedocles…says that the world, by being
whirled around, received a movement quick enough to overpower its
own downward tendency, and thus has been kept from destruction
all this time.”
(De Caelo 2.1.284a,25)
Aristotle on the ultimate cause of motion according to Anaxagoras
and Empedocles: “If then it is possible that at any time nothing
should be in motion, this must come about in one of two ways: either
in the manner described by Anaxagoras, who says that all things were
together and at rest for an infinite period of time, and that then Mind
introduced motion and separated them; or in the manner described
Back to catalog entry Seller1700
Aristotle wrote that an infinite stellar region cannot rotate:
“The infinite,…cannot,… move in a circle. For there is no centre of the infinite, and
that which moves in a circle moves about the centre.” (De Caelo 1.7.275b,15)
On souls of the planets as motive force:
Donahue, William H. The Dissolution of the Celestial Spheres 1595-1650. New
York: Arno Press, 1981. 192.
Thompson, Silvanus Phillips. On the Magnet by William Gilbert. (Reprint of
Thompson’s translation published in 1900). New York: Basic Books, 1958. 209210.
Descartes sought a mechanical explanation:
Note: Implying that there are no physical spheres in the heavens by asserting that
the heavens are fluid, “an opinion which is now commonly held by all
Astronomers,” Descartes clarifies that fluidity is not the same as empty space, as
some astronomers suggested. Empty space “not only offers no resistance to the
motion of other bodies, but also lacks the force to carry them along with it.” The
particles comprising the fluid heavens, Descartes asserts, “have motion in
themselves” allowing them to move the heavenly bodies. Descartes. Principia
Philosophia 3.24-25. Trans. Valentine Rodger Miller. Principles of Philosophy.
London: Reidel, 1983. 93.
[On God as the ultimate source of motion in Descartes, see under Pemberton].
Newton 1729
Back to catalog entry Newton1729
This frontispiece features a novel view of a novel idea:
Note: The image of the solar system in the frontispiece of volume 1 is unique in
that it indicates lines of gravity. One possible inspiration for it may be found in the
106
diagram labeled as Figure 5 on Plate 5 of vol.2 (illustrating Proposition XXV,
Theorem XX, in Book 2). This diagram is among a few diagrams drawn in shadow
in the foreground of the frontispiece of volume 2, drawing a visual connection
between the frontispieces. In the second frontispiece, gravity is represented by
putti performing pendulum experiments on the resistance of air (behind them at
right, the fluid experiments can be seen in shadow).
Note: The frontispiece of volume 1 includes a passage from a dedicatory poem by
Edmund Halley found at the beginning of Newton’s work: “Mathematics drove
away the Cloud, no longer doubting in the mists we stray; Genius’ high summit
grants to us the Way to reach the blessed Gods’ Abodes and pierce the lofty Limits
of the Universe.” (trans.by Otto Steinmayer). Another passage from the poem
more directly relates to the image of the solar system: “The inmost place of the
heavens, now gained, breaks into view, nor longer hidden is the force that turns
the farthest orb. The sun exalted on his throne bids all things tend toward him by
inclination and descent.” (trans. By Leon Richardson). Halley makes a poetic
reference to the farthest orb (the stellar sphere), which by that time was no
longer thought to exist or to turn, and the last sentence corresponds well with
the pendulum theme and the lines of gravity shown.
Newton describes extensive experiments:
“I found the resistance of the air by the following experiments. I suspended a
wooden globe or ball… by a fine thread on a firm hook, so that the distance
between the hook and the centre of oscillation of the globe was 10 ½ foot…”
(Motte. Book II. Section VI. Gen.Schol. 95-96.)
“In order to compare the resistance of different fluids with each other, I made the
following trial. I procured a wooden vessel 4 feet long… This vessel, being
uncovered, I filled with spring water, and having immersed pendulums therein, I
made them oscillate in the water.” (Motte. Book II. Section VI. Gen. Schol. 103)
He stated that gravity affects the bodies of the planets in the solar system in the
same way that it pulls bodies toward the earth:
“The nature of gravity towards the planets is the same as towards the earth… The
weights of the planets toward the sun must be as their quantities of matter.”
(Motte. Book III. Prop. VI. Theor. VI. 221-222).
Quote: “If the circumsolar Planets were supposed to be let fall…”
Motte. Book III. Prop. VI. Theorem VI. 222.
Pemberton 1728
Back to catalog entry Pemberton1728
On gravity not inherent: “That gravity should be innate, inherent, and essential to
matter…is to me so great an absurdity that I believe no man who has in
philosophical matters a competent faculty of thinking can ever fall into it.”
Newton. Letter to Richard Bentley. MS. Newton Project. University of Sussex.
[n.d.] Web. 2009. http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk
Inherent soul replaced by matter in motion:
Roger, Jacques. “The mechanistic conception of life.” God & Nature. Ed. David
Lindberg. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986. 280.
“According to the Epicurean philosophy, atoms were naturally endowed with
activity; there was no need for any other source of motion.” In the 17th century,
“The majority of scientists regarded matter as entirely passive;” God gave matter
motion.
On Kepler’s rejection of anima as motive force in his Epitome:
Gingerich, Owen. Johannes Kepler, in part A, p. 74 of Rene Taton. Planetary
astronomy from the Renaissance to the rise of astrophysics. Volume 2. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1989.
Note: in his Astronomia nova, Kepler addresses himself, agreeing with Plato
regarding the motion of the planets: “So then, Kepler, would you give each of the
planets a pair of eyes? By no means, nor is this necessary, no more than that they
need feet or wings in order to move.” But he rejects Plato’s inherent soul:
“Anyone who says that the body of a planet is moved by an inherent force is just
plain wrong.” (Astronomia nova 3.39.191; Donahue 414).
Kepler stops short of rejecting Mind in this work:
“the mental motion appears to give evidence of the magnetic one, and to require
its assistance, no matter how you equip it with an animate faculty of moving the
body. For in the first place, mind by itself can do nothing in a body… an animate
faculty cannot transport its body from place to place…Therefore, it will be a
magnetic, that is, natural, faculty of sympathy between the bodies of the planet
and the sun. Thus the mind calls upon nature and the magnets for assistance.”
Kepler. Astronomia Nova 4.57.280; New Astronomy. Trans. William H. Donahue.
568.
107
admired at close range by [alien] reasonable creatures. (Huygens 8).
Note: Although Kepler in his later work denied that the planets were besouled, he
never lived down his early musings. A nineteenth century dictionary includes this
entry:
Kepler’s fairy: the fairy which guides the planets. Kepler said that each planet was
guided in its elliptical orbit by a resident angel. (Brewer, E. Cobham. Dictionary of
Phrase and Fable. 1898.)
The dictionary entry makes a leap between the Platonic anima and the Christian
interpretation of the Aristotelian eternal movers (Metaphysics 12.8.1073b) as
angels.
On the requirement for God’s continuous presence, in Descartes:
Ashworth, William B. “Catholicism and Early Modern Science.” God & Nature. Ed.
David Lindberg. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986. 139.
Huygens 1774
Huygens. 126.
“An amazing thing it must be, all of a sudden to have the Sun darken’d, and fall
into a pitch-night, without seeing any cause of such an accident. All which while
their Moons are their only Comfort.”
Huygens 1724
Back to catalog entry Huygens1724
Bos, Henk J. M. “Christiaan Huygens”. Dictionary of Scientific Biography. NY:
Scribner’s, 1972.
Crowe, Michael J. The Extraterrestrial Life Debate 1750-1900. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1986. 20-22.
Scheiner 1630
“In him all things are contained and moved…”
Newton. Principia (General Scholium). Trans. Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman.
Isaac Newton. The Principia. University of California Press, 1999. 941-942.
Back to catalog entry Huygens1774
Back to catalog entry Scheiner1630
On sunspots as perfect planets:
Donahue, William. The Dissolution of the Celestial Spheres. NY: Arno Press, 1981.
108.
Wilkins 1640
General info/no refs.
Section 7: Plurality of Worlds
Huygens 1698
Back to catalog entry Huygens1698
Huygens, Christian. The Celestial Worlds Discover’d. London: Frank Cass and Co.,
1968. (Facsimile reproduction).
Multitude of earths (Huygens 11)
The other planets are like earth: “Now since in so many things they thus agree,”
Huygens suggests that “the other planets are as beautiful and as well stock’d
with Inhabitants as the Earth.” (Huygens 17-18)
Note: other relevant topics: Guessing about distant planets by observing moon
(Huygens 18); the planets are solid like the earth; they have gravity as evidenced
in their round shape (Huygens 19); let us see by what steps we must rise to the
attaining some knowledge in the state and furniture of these new earths. How
likely is it that they may be stock’d with plants and animals as well as we are.
(Huygens 19); on other solar systems: stars that are distant to us are probably
Descartes 1656
Back to catalog entry Descartes1656
Our sun was in fact not the center of anything except our own planetary system:
Note: as noted under Descartes 1644 in Section 6, Descartes removed our sun
from a central location and placed it among the other stars in his theory of
vortices. Girodano Bruno had also placed our sun among the other stars; he in
turn had been influenced by Nicolas of Cusa, who espoused the idea that “God is
an infinite sphere, whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere.”
Grant, Edward. Planets, Stars, and Orbs: the Medieval Cosmos, 1200-1687.
Cambridge University Press, 1994. 175.
The laws of motion of Descartes and of Newton:
Ashworth, William B. (Exhibit Advisor). Note to C. Rogers. March 2010:
“One interesting consequence of both Descartes’ and Newton’s theories is that,
since inertia is universal (Descartes), or gravitation is universal (Newton), then
108
stars could well be other suns, with other planets going around them. This was
not true before them (with the significant exception of Bruno).” Not true, for
example, of the motive forces of Gilbert or Kepler (see under Section 6).
Euler 1744
Quote:
Lucretius. De Rerum Natura 2.1069; On the Nature of the Universe. Trans. Ronald
Latham. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1951. 91.
Doppelmayer 1742
Mallement 1679
Back to catalog entry Mallement1679
Thorndike, Lynn. A History of Magic and Experimental Science. Vol. 8. NY:
Columbia University Press, 1957. 340.
Schechner, Sara J. Comets, Popular Culture and the Birth of Modern Cosmology.
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999. 111.
Back to catalog entry Euler1744
Youschkevitch, A. P. “Euler, Leonhard.” Dictionary of Scientific Biography. NY:
Scribner’s, 1971.
Back to catalog entry Doppelmayr1742
Aristotle. De Caelo. 1.9.278a, 25.
Barin 1686
Back to catalog entry
Magruder, Kerry V. “The idiom of a six day creation and global depictions in
Theories of the Earth.” Geology and Religion. Ed. Martina Kolbl-Ebert. London:
Geological Society, 2009. 52-53.
Fontenelle 1686
General info/no refs.
Fontenelle 1701
Back to catalog entry Fontenelle1701
Delorme, Suzanne. “Fontenelle, Bernard Le Bouyer (or Bovier) De.” Dictionary of
Scientific Biography. NY: Scribner’s, 1972.
Dick, Steven J. Plurality of Worlds. Cambridge University Press, 1982. 123-127.
Bonnycastle 1787
Back to catalog entry Bonnycastle1787
Plato. Timaeus. Trans. Benjamin Jowett. The Dialogues of Plato. New York:
Random House, 1937. 2 vols. (Jowett 2:15).
Maupertuis 1742
Back to catalog entry Maupertuis1742
Maupertuis’ concept of variable stars:
Ashworth, William B. (Exhibit Advisor). Note to C. Rogers. March 2010.
Grant, Robert. History of Physical Astronomy. London: Henry G. Bohn, 1852. 541.
Principle of least action:
Glass, Bentley. “Maupertuis, Pierre Louis Moreau De.” Dictionary of Scientific
Biography. NY: Scribner’s, 1974.
Nelson, Richard. Ed. “Principle of Least Action: Maupertuis.” Cambridge Forecast
Group. 2006. Web. 2009.
Section 8: Measuring the Distance to the Stars
Note: the atlases by Flamsteed, Jamieson, and Meissner are used in the exhibit
simply to show the locations of stars that were the focus of various astronomers in
the quest for stellar parallax. Atlases appropriate to the periods discussed were
selected, although the Flamsteed edition is rather later and was selected because
Flamsteed was both a parallax seeker and the source of the atlas. The time span
for Gamma Draconis as the focus of parallax ranged from 1669 (Hooke) to 1679
(Flamsteed) to 1725 (Bradley). Guidance with the atlases was provided by
William B. Ashworth (Exhibit Advisor).
Flamsteed 1776
Back to catalog entry Flamsteed1776
On Hooke and Draconis:
Hirshfeld, Alan W. Parallax: the Race to Measure the Cosmos. NY: Freeman, 2001.
144.
On Flamsteed and Draconis:
Hirshfeld. 147.
On Bradley and Draconis:
Hirshfeld. 155-156.
109
On this edition of Flamsteed’s atlas:
Ashworth, William B. “Out of This World: The Golden Age of the Celestial Atlas”
Linda Hall Library. 2007. Web. 2009.
http://www.lindahall.org/events_exhib/exhibit/exhibits/stars/for.htm
The 1776 ed. of Flamsteed’s atlas is catalog number 30; other Flamsteed entries
are catalog numbers 27, 33, and 35 in this online exhibit.
On Bradley, aberration of light:
Webb, Stephen. Measuring the Universe: the Cosmological Distance Ladder.
Chichester UK: Praxis Publishing, 1999. 67-68.
Horrebow 1735 (Roemer)
Back to catalog entry Horrebow1735
Detailed description of Roemer’s transit instrument:
Grant, Robert. History of Physical Astronomy. London: Bohn, 1852. 461-467.
(translated from Horrebow). This transit instrument, used in Roemer’s home, was
his main instrument until his “Tusculan Observatory” was built in 1704. (Grant
465). The transit instrument built in his home was eventually (1715) placed in the
Round Tower (Grant 462), which Roemer did not use as his main observatory
because of wind.
Brief description of the engraving of transit instrument (with image of a
commemorative bronze relief inspired by the engraving):
Neilson, Axel V. “Ole Roemer and his Meridian Circle.” Vistas in Astronomy. Beer.
Ed. London: Pergamon Press, 1968. Vol. 10. 105-112.
On Mayer’s use of Roemer’s Triduum, and that the search for parallax inspired
Roemer to invent/build his instruments:
Hoeg, Erik. “400 Years of Astrometry: from Tycho Brahe to Hipparcos.”
Contribution to the History of Astrometry. No. 8. Noordwijk: ESTC (2008):6.
On parallax as Roemer’s main goal, and Horrebow’s publications of stellar
parallax based on his own and Roemer’s obss.:
Moesgaard, Kristian Peder. “How Copernicanism took root in Denmark and
Norway.” The Reception of Copernicus’ Heliocentric Theory. Jerzy Dobrzycki. Ed.
Dordrecht-Holland: D. Reidel, 1972-73. 142. Note: Moesgaard mentions the
meridian circle as built in Roemer’s home observatory but it was not built until his
country observatory was complete (Robert Grant 463). The instrument in
Roemer’s home observatory was the transit instrument (also used to observe
along the meridian). (Robert Grant 463).
On Roemer’s results of obss.of Sirius and Lyra [Vega]:
Moesgaard states that Roemer “maintains to have found, for the said two stars
separated by about 180 degrees, a semestrial variation of the difference between
their right ascensions which shows the double sum of their parallaxes to be about
0;1 degree” (Moesgaard 142). Roemer was afraid his clocks were off due to
affects of temperature variations and did not publish his paper. (Moesgaard 142).
Note: Unrelated to his work on stellar parallax, Roemer’s most celebrated
contribution to astronomy was his determination of the speed of light. Observing
Jupiter’s moon Io over many months, he noted that the time it took for its light to
reach his telescope varied with the distance of earth from Io as Earth orbited the
sun. He realized that Io’s light took longer to reach earth when earth was further
away from Io than when it was closer, and he timed the difference. (Fowler,
Michael. “Speed of Light.” UVA Physics Department. N.d. Web. 2009.
http://galileo.phys.virginia.edu/classes/109N/lectures/spedlite.html; Roemer, Ole.
“Demonstration touchant le movement de la lumiere.” Journal des Scavans.
December 7, 1676.)
Relevant Quotation
Roemer measured the time it took light to travel from a celestial
body to earth; Plato in contrast explained how the celestial bodies
measured time:
“When the father and creator saw the creature which he has made
moving and living…, he rejoiced, and in his joy determined to...
make the universe eternal, so far as might be. …Wherefore he
resolved to have a moving image of eternity, and when he set in
order the heaven, he made this image eternal but moving according
to number, while eternity itself rests in unity; and this image we call
time… Such was the mind and thought of God in the creation of
110
time. The sun and moon and five other stars, which are called the
planets, were created by him in order to distinguish and preserve
the numbers of time… And for this reason the fixed stars were
created, to be divine and eternal animals, ever-abiding and
revolving after the same manner and on the same spot…”
(Jowett. v. 2. Timaeus, p. 19)
Chichester UK: Praxis Publishing, 1999. 71-72.
On the Gold Medal ceremony:
Belkora, Leila. Minding the Heavens: the Story of Our Discovery of the Milky Way.
Bristol UK: Inst of Physics Pub Inc, 2003. 156.
Jamieson 1822
Back to catalog entry Jamieson1822
Bessel’s parallax: calculated distance in miles 60 trillion:
Hirshfeld, Alan W. Parallax: the Race to Measure the Cosmos. NY: Freeman, 2001.
262-263.
Ptolemy estimated the distance to the sphere of the fixed stars as about 60
million miles.
Webb, Stephen. Measuring the Universe: the Cosmological Distance Ladder.
Chichester UK: Praxis Publishing, 1999. 34. Note: Derived from his Ptolemy’s
Planetary Hypothesis.
On Bessel’s method:
Webb 71.
Arago 1855
Wright 1750
Back to catalog entry Wright1750Perspective
A summary of Wright’s proposals:
Jaki, Stanley L. Trans. Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens. By
Immanuel Kant. Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1981. 22 (Introduction).
Another summary of Wright’s proposals:
Harrison, Edward. Darkness at Night: a Riddle of the Universe. Cambridge MA;
London: Harvard University Press, 1987. 103; 241.
A discussion of Wright’s proposals:
Whitrow, G.J. “Kant and the Extragalactic Nebulae.” Colloquium on Historical
Aspects of Astronomy. University of Exeter, 1966. 50-55.
Back to catalog entry Arago1855
On the Fraunhofer heliometer:
Webb, Stephen. Measuring the Universe: the Cosmological Distance Ladder.
Chichester UK: Praxis Publishing, 1999. 70.
Gill, David, Sir. “Heliometer.” 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica. (author identified in
print ed.).
http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Heliometer
Meissner 1805
Section 9: From Solar Systems to Star Systems
On Immanuel Kant’s acknowledgement of Wright’s proposals:
Munitz, Milton. Ed. Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens. By
Immanuel Kant. Trans. W. Hastie. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1969.
xiv-xviii (Introduction).
The English translation of the complete review of Wright’s work that was cited
by Kant:
Hastie, W. Trans. “The Hamburg Account of Wright’s Theory.” Universal Natural
History and Theory of the Heavens. By Immanuel Kant. Ed. Milton Munitz. Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1969. 170-180 (Appendix).
Back to catalog entry Meissner1805
On Henderson:
Webb, Stephen. Measuring the Universe: the Cosmological Distance Ladder.
Descriptions of the plates are taken from:
111
Wright, Thomas. An Original Theory or New Hypothesis of the Universe. 1750.
Facsimile reprint. Ed. Michael A. Hoskin. London: Macdonald and Co., 1971: 6265.
1. Perspective view of Milky Way: “the irregularity we observe in it I judge to
be entirely owing to our Sun’s Position.” (Wright. 62-63.)
2. Stars orbit a central point: (Note: the realization that the sun and other
stars orbit a central point was Wright’s key contribution to astronomy). “It
being once agreed, that the stars are in motion,… we must consider in what
manner they move.” Stars must move in curves rather than straight lines
“i.e. in an orbit;” “It only now remains to shew how a number of stars, so
disposed in a circular manner round any given center, may solve the
[appearance of the Milky Way]. There are two ways possible [Wright was
indifferent about the shape and never stated a preference+… The first is…
all moving the same way, and not much deviating from the same plane, as
the planets in their heliocentric motion do round the solar body. [Diagram]:
In this case the primary, secondary, and tertiary constituent orbits, &c.
framing the hypotheses, are represented in plate XXII.” This plate identifies
the earth (C) orbiting the sun (B), which orbits a central point (A). (Wright.
63.) Back to catalog entry
3. Ring-shaped galaxy: Wright introduces the ring-shaped galaxy on p. 63:
“There are two ways possible… The first is…,. all moving the same way, and
not much deviating from the same plane” but Wright describes the plate of
the ring system on p. 65: “Hence we may imagine some Creations of Stars
may move…; others again, as the primary planets do, in a general Zone or
Zodiack, or more properly in the manner of Saturn’s rings…as shewn in
plate XXVIII [edge-on view of ring shape] . Nothing being more evident,
than that if all the stars we see moved in one vast ring, like those of Saturn,
round any central body, or point, the general phaenomena of our stars
would be solved by it; see plate XXIX” *view of ring shape from above,
figure 1; and edge-on, figure 2]. (Wright. 63; 65.) Back to catalog entry
4. Spherical galaxy: “The second method of solving this phaenomena, is by a
spherical order of the stars, all moving with different direction round one
common center…but in a kind of shell, or concave orb.” *plates XXIV-XXV].
Description of plate: “a representation of the Convexity, if I may call it so,
of the intire Creation, as a universal Coalition of all the Stars confphered
round one general Center.” (Wright. 64.) Back to catalog entry
Wright1750Sphere
5. Cross section of spherical galaxy: Description of plate: “a central Section of
the same, with the Eye of Providence seated in the Center, as in the virtual
Agent of Creation.” (Wright. 64.)
Note: Wright proposes an ideal center of the galaxy shown in the plate of
the cross section of the spherical galaxy: “Here the to-all extending Eye of
Providence” etc.; “Thus in the center of Creation, I would willingly
introduce a primitive Fountain” etc. (Wright 78-79.); and a real center of
the galaxy shown in the plate of the ring-shaped galaxy : “But what this
central Body really is… if the Creation is real and not merely ideal, be either
a globe of fire superior to the sun, or otherwise a vast terraqueous or
terrestrial sphere...” (Wright. 79.) Back to catalog entry Wright1750Cross
Bode 1812
Back to catalog entry Bode1812
Ashworth, William B. “Out of This World: The Golden Age of the Celestial Atlas”
Linda Hall Library. 2007. Web. 2009.
http://www.lindahall.org/events_exhib/exhibit/exhibits/stars/bodb.htm
Bode’s Uranigraphia is catalog entry 36 in this online exhibit.
Relevant Quotations
Galileo and the Milky Way: Although he does not speculate on why
the stars would gather there, Galileo’s description of the Milky Way
as seen through the telescope for the first time is thrilling:
“I have observed the nature and the material of the Milky Way. With
the aid of the telescope this has been scrutinized so directly and with
such ocular certainty that all the disputes which have vexed
philosophers through so many ages have been resolved, and we are
at last freed from wordy debates about it. The galaxy is, in fact,
112
nothing but a congeries of innumerable stars grouped together in
clusters. Upon whatever part of it the telescope is directed, a vast
crowd of stars is immediately presented to view. Many of them are
rather large and quite bright, while the number of smaller ones is
quite beyond calculation.”
(Galileo. Sidereus nuncius. 1610. Trans. Stillman Drake. Discoveries
and Opinions of Galileo. NY: Doubleday, 1957.)
The apparent variation in the depth of field of the stars inherent in
his description lent support to the conception of the stars as
dispersed rather than limited to a sphere.
Plato and the Milky Way: the only author apart from Thomas Wright
who assigned a structural role to the Milky Way may be Plato. Some
scholars believe that the spindle in his “Myth of Er” (Republic, Book
X. Jowett: 1:874) represented the Milky Way, on which the whorl of
our planetary system rotated. In that analogy, the Milky Way is a
“line of light, straight as a column, extending right through the whole
heaven… this light is the belt of heaven, and holds together the circle
of the universe, like the under-girders of a trireme.” This line of light
is described as a spindle that pierces the center of the whorl. The
whorl is comprised of nested whorls, “like vessels which fit into one
another.” The outermost, or largest, is “spangled,” representing the
hemisphere of the starry sky; within it are the whorls of the planets.
Plato seems to suggest that the ends of the Milky Way extend
considerably beyond the hemisphere of the stars. (Purves, John.
Selections from the Dialogues of Plato, with preface by Jowett.
Oxford: Clarendon, 1883. Agrees that Plato’s spindle represents the
Milky Way; Jowett, Benjamin. Republic of Plato translated into
English. Oxford: Clarendon, 1908. Disagrees that Plato’s spindle
represents the Milky Way.)
Hevelius 1690
Back to catalog entry Hevelius1690
Edmond Halley sailed to St. Helena… to record the positions of over 300 stars:
Cook, Alan. Edmond Halley: Charting the Heavens and the Seas. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1998. 65-79.
Hevelius included Halley’s stars in this atlas:
“Hevelius used Halley’s chart as the basis for his own southern map.” Ashworth,
William B. “Out of This World: The Golden Age of the Celestial Atlas” Linda Hall
Library. 2007. Web. 2009.
http://www.lindahall.org/events_exhib/exhibit/exhibits/stars/hev.htm
The atlas is catalog entry 22 in this online exhibit.
Halley’s catalog of the southern stars:
Halley, Edmond. Catalogus stellarum australium. 1679. Facsimile online. Internet
Archives. Web. 2009. Note: Halley recorded several star positions in Argo and
Canis Major in relation to the “heart of the serpent” and Sirius (the nose of the
dog). 21-24.
http://www.archive.org/stream/catalogusstella00hallgoog#page/n21/mode/2up
On Halley’s discovery of the proper motion of stars:
Cook, Alan. Edmond Halley: Charting the Heavens and the Seas. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1998. 348-349.
Halley, Edmond. “Considerations on the Change of the Latitudes of Some of the
Principal Fixt Stars.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. 1718.
30.355.736-738.
Thomas Wright quoted Halley’s article:
Wright, Thomas. An Original Theory or New Hypothesis of the Universe. 1750.
Facsimile reprint. Ed. Michael A. Hoskin. London: Macdonald and Co., 1971: 5354. [quote lacks closing quotation marks, near bottom of p. 54].
Kant 1798
Back to catalog entry Kant1798
Kant credited Thomas Wright for providing some ideas for his cosmology:
Kant, Immanuel. Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens. Trans.
Stanley L. Jaki. Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1981. 30-31 (Jaki’s introd.);
88-90 (Kant).
Wright seemed unaware of the limitations that gravity would place:
Wright: “But we are not confined by this Theory to this form only; there may be
various systems of stars… it is not at all necessary, that every collective body of
113
stars should move in the same direction, or after the same model of motion, but
may as reasonably be supposed as much to vary… Hence we may imagine some
Creations of stars may move in the direction of perfect spheres, all variously
inclined, direct and retrograde [this could not happen]; others again, as the
primary planets do, in a general zone or zodiac, or more properly in the manner of
Saturn’s rings” *this follows Newton’s laws+.
this theme:
Pitts Theology Library. Digital Image Archive. N.d. Web. 2009.
http://www.pitts.emory.edu/dia/listform.cfm
Note: for example, see no.1557BiblV2.Pagnini, Sante:
http://www.pitts.emory.edu/woodcuts/1557BiblV2/00009041.jpg
Flammarion 1888
Back to catalog entry Flammarion1888
Note: this popular image is often described as a Renaissance woodcut, but it first
appeared in, and was drawn especially for, this 1888 edition of Flammarion. The
text that it illustrates, describing the history of the stellar crystalline sphere, is as
delightful as the image.
Magruder, Kerry. Home page. “Is This a Medieval Flat-Earth Woodcut?” 2003.
Web. 2009. (Includes English translation not only of the caption, but of the entire
passage).
http://homepage.mac.com/kvmagruder/flatEarth/
Pre-Raphaelite:
Note: This nineteenth-century art movement was characterized by an interest in
art of the fifteenth century. Since the image is not a Renaissance image, was
made in the nineteenth century, and could be interpreted as representing the
style, it may be best described as belonging to or influenced by this movement.
Origin of image:
Flammarion woodcut. Wikipedia. N.p. n.d. Web. 2009.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flammarion_woodcut
Note: this source notes that the anonymous, unsigned image could have been
drawn by Flammarion himself, who was trained in engraving. This seems likely, as
the image does not seem to be in the particular style of any other artist of the
period. Quill pens are drawn in the frame of the image, and are also found in the
frame of Walter Crane’s bookplate (The Denis Gouey Bookbinding Studio. N.d.
Web. 2009. http://bookbinding.com/book-cover-design/bookplates) but the
Flammarion image does not particularly look like Crane’s work.
Ezekiel’s Vision:
The wheel-within-a-wheel is the tipoff. An especially good collection of images of
Section 10: The First Map of the Galaxy
Bode 1782
Back to catalog entry Bode1782
Forbes, Eric G. Tobias Mayer’s Opera Inedita: the first translation of the
Lichtenberg edition of 1775. NY: Macmillan, 1971. 110-112.
Herschel 1783
Back to catalog entry Herschel1783
Herschel, William. “On the Proper Motion of the Sun and Solar System.”
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society 73:247-283 (January 1, 1783).
Herschel 1785
Back to catalog entry
Herschel, William. “On the Construction of the Heavens.” Philosophical
Transactions of the Royal Society 75:213-266 (January 1, 1785).
Note: between his 1783 and 1785 papers, Herschel published another paper
in the Philosophical Transactions entitled “Account of some Observations
tending to investigate the Construction of the Heavens.” (January 1, 1784
74:437-451; Included in Hoskin, Michael. William Herschel and the
Construction of the Heavens. London: Oldbourne, 1963. 71-82; plate 3 caption
mentions Wright). A close reading of the description of the Milky Way in this
article, read alongside Thomas Wright’s, reveals some paraphrasing by
Herschel of Wright’s work. (Herschel’s article p. 76 in Hoskin; pp. 443-444 in
Phil. Trans.; compare to pp. 62-63 in Wright’s Original Theory). Leila Belkora
notes that Herschel owned a copy of Wright’s Original Theory, annotated in
114
Herschel’s hand. Belkora, Leila. Minding the Heavens. Bristol: Institute of
Physics. 2003. 100.)
Nebulae as the original impetus in making the 1783 star sweeps:
Sidgwick, John B. William Herschel: Explorer of the Heavens. London: Faber
and Faber, 1953. 116.
Herschel’s introduction of his star gaging technique:
Hoskin, Michael A. William Herschel and the Construction of the Heavens.
London: Oldbourne, 1963. 77.
On Herschel’s assumptions, map, and approach to observing:
Webb, Stephen. Measuring the Universe : the Cosmological Distance Ladder.
Chichester UK: Praxis Publishing, 1999. 131-135.
Johnston 1855
Back to catalog entry Johnston1855
On Herschel and double stars:
Sidgwick, John B. William Herschel: Explorer of the Heavens. London: Faber
and Faber, 1953. 178-180.
Mitchel 1861
Back to catalog entry Mitchel1861
On the extent of Herschel’s galaxy:
Hoskin, Michael. William Herschel and the Construction of the Heavens.
London: Oldbourne, 1963. 169.
Smyth 1844
Back to catalog entry Smyth1844
Shapley’s 1918 galactic cluster study showed that our sun is not near the
center of the galaxy:
Longair, M.S. The Cosmic Century: a History of Astrophysics and Cosmology.
Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2006. 83.
Lindblad demonstrated in 1925 that the sun orbits the galaxy:
“Bertil Lindblad.” Obituary notices. Quarterly Journal of the Royal
Astronomical Society. 7. (1966): 332.
Coda Back to catalog entry Coda
Multiple galaxies: “But we are not confined by this Theory to this form *i.e.
these forms: the ring-shaped or spherical] only; there may be various
systems of stars [Wright did not seem to particularly care what forms they
may take; his key idea was that they orbited together around a central
point+… it is not at all necessary, that every collective body of stars should
move in the same direction, or after the same model of motion, but may
reasonably be supposed as much to vary… Hence we may imagine some
Creations [galaxies] of stars may move in the direction of perfect spheres…
others again, as the primary planets do, in a general zone or zodiac, or
more properly in the manner of Saturn’s rings.” Note: Wright states in the
text that “Creations of stars,” or galaxies, may take diverse shapes, but he
includes more illustrations of spherical galaxies. (Wright. 65.)
“As the visible Creation is supposed to be full of sidereal systems and
planetary worlds, so on, in like similar manner, the endless immensity is an
unlimited plenum of Creations… see plate XXXI… plate XXXII represents
their sections.” (Wright. 83.)
“That this in all probability may be the real case, is in some degree made
evident by the many cloudy spots, just perceivable by us, as far without our
starry regions, in which tho’ visibly luminous spaces, no one star or
particular constituent body can possibly be distinguished; those in all
likelyhood may be external Creation, bordering upon the known one, too
remote for even our telescopes to reach.” (Wright. 83.)
115
List of Secondary Works Cited
Aiton, E. J. “Peurbach’s Theoricae Novae Planetarum.” Osiris 2nd series. 3
(1987): 5-44.
Applebaum, Wilbur. “Vincent Wing.” Dictionary of Scientific Biography. 1976.
Aristotle. “Metaphysics.” Trans. W. D. Ross. Great Books of the Western World.
Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: Wm. Benton, Encyclopedia Britannica,
1952. Vol. 8: 499-626.
Aristotle. “On the Heavens.” Trans. W. D. Ross. Great Books of the Western
World. Ed. Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: Wm. Benton, Encyclopedia
Britannica, 1952. Vol. 8: 359-405.
Aristotle “Physics.” Trans. W. D. Ross. Great Books of the Western World. Ed.
Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: Wm. Benton, Encyclopedia Britannica,
1952. Vol. 8: 259-355.
Ashworth, William B. “Catholicism and Early Modern Science.” God & Nature.
Ed. David Lindberg. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986.
Ashworth, William B. “Iconography of a New Physics.” History and Technology
4.2 (1987).
Ashworth, William B. “Out of This World: The Golden Age of the Celestial
Atlas” Linda Hall Library. 2007. Web. 2009. (Pages for Ptolemy 1515, Hyginus
1512, Kepler 1606, Flamsteed/Fortin 1776, Bode 1801, and Hevelius 1690).
http://www.lindahall.org/events_exhib/exhibit/exhibits/stars/index.htm
Barker, Peter. “Copernicus and the Critics of Ptolemy.” Journal for the History of
Astronomy, (Nov.1999). Web. 2009.
Baumgartner, Frederic J. “Skepticism and French Interest in Copernicanism to
1630.” Journal for the History of Astronomy 17 (1986): 78.
Belkora, Leila. Minding the Heavens: the Story of Our Discovery of the Milky
Way. Bristol UK: Inst of Physics Pub Inc, 2003.
Bos, Henk J. M. “Christiaan Huygens.” Dictionary of Scientific Biography. NY:
Scribner’s, 1972.
Brahe, Tycho. De mundi aetherei . Passage translated by Bruce Bradley, from
Dreyer, J.L.E. (ed.) Opera Omnia (1913-29), vol. 4. 222.
Brewer, E. Cobham. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Bruno, Giordano. On the Infinite Universe and Worlds. 1584. Trans. Dorothea
Waley Singer. New York: Schuman, 1950.
Cahill, Hugh. "Every Person Naturally Seeks to Know” Rare Books Collection,
Kings College, London, an online exhibition of books on ancient Greek science
and medicine from the Foyle Special Collections Library. August 25, 2005.
Web. 2009.
http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/iss/library/speccoll/exhibitions/gsci/ast.html
“Christian angelic hierarchy.” Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia
Foundation, Inc. [n.d.] Web. 2009.
Cook, Alan. Edmond Halley: Charting the Heavens and the Seas. Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1998.
Crowe, Michael J. The Extraterrestrial Life Debate 1750-1900. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1986.
“John Dee (Mathematician).” Absolute Astronomy Encyclopedia. n.d. Web.
2009.
Delorme, Suzanne. “Fontenelle, Bernard Le Bouyer (or Bovier) De.” Dictionary
of Scientific Biography. NY: Scribner’s, 1972.
The Denis Gouey Bookbinding Studio. N.d. Web. 2009.
http://bookbinding.com/book-cover-design/bookplates)
Descartes. Principia Philosophia. Trans. Valentine Rodger Miller. Principles of
Philosophy. London: Reidel, 1983.
Dick, Steven J. Plurality of Worlds. Cambridge University Press, 1982.
116
Donahue, William H. The Dissolution of the Celestial Spheres 1595-1650. New
York: Arno Press, 1981.
Donahue, William H. Johannes Kepler: New Astronomy. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1992.
Flammarion woodcut. Wikipedia. N.p. n.d. Web. 2009.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flammarion_woodcut
Fletcher, John E. “Astronomy in the Life and Correspondence of Athanasius
Kircher.” Isis 61.1. 206 (1970): 52-53.
Forbes, Eric G. Tobias Mayer’s Opera Inedita: the first translation of the
Lichtenberg edition of 1775. NY: Macmillan, 1971. 110-112.
Gilbert William. On the Magnet by William Gilbert. Trans. Silvanus Phillips
Thompson (Reprint of Thompson’s translation published in 1900). New York:
Basic Books, 1958.
Gill, David, Sir. “Heliometer.” 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica. (author identified
in print ed.).
http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Heliometer
Gingerich, Owen. The Eye of Heaven: Ptolemy, Copernicus, Kepler. New York:
American Institute of Physics, 1993.
Gingerich, Owen. “Johannes Kepler.” Planetary astronomy from the Renaissance
to the rise of astrophysics. Ed. Rene Taton and Curtis Wilson. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1989.
Fowler, Michael. “Speed of Light.” UVA Physics Department. N.d. Web. 2009.
http://galileo.phys.virginia.edu/classes/109N/lectures/spedlite.html
Gingerich, Owen. “Sacrobosco Illustrated.” Between Demonstration and
Imagination: Essays in the History of Science and Philosophy Presented to John
D. North. Ed. Lodi Nauta and Arjo Banderjagt. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill, 1999.
French, Peter T. John Dee: The World of an Elizabethan Magus. NY: Routledge,
1972 (reprinted 2002). 46.
Ginzburg, Vladimir B. Prime elements of ordinary matter. Boca Raton:
Universal Publishers, 2007 (2nd ed.) 24-27.
Frommert, Hartmut . “Early variable star discoverers.” Spider’s Homepage.
SEDS (Students for the Exploration and Development of Space). 1995. Web.
2009.
http://seds.org/~spider/spider/Vars/Add/var-dis.html
Glass, Bentley. “Maupertuis, Pierre Louis Moreau De.” Dictionary of Scientific
Biography. NY: Scribner’s, 1974.
Galileo. Sidereus nuncius. 1610. Trans. Stillman Drake. Discoveries and Opinions
of Galileo. NY: Doubleday, 1957.)
Gatti, Hilary. Giordano Bruno and Renaissance Science. Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1999.
Gent, Robert Harry van. The finest atlas of the heavens. [Harmonia
macrocosmica of 1660; Facsimile with introduction]. Hong Kong; Los Angeles:
Taschen, 2006. 9; 239.
Gilbert, William. On the Loadstone. Trans. P. Fleury Mottelay. Baltimore:
Peabody Institute Library, 1892 [reprinted 1938].
Godwin, Joscelyn. Robert Fludd: Hermetic philosopher and surveyor of two
worlds. London: Thames and Hudson, 1979.
Goldstein, Bernard R. “The Arabic version of Ptolemy’s Planetary Hypothesis.”
Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 2nd ser. 57. 4 (1967): 3-12.
Grant, Edward. Planets, Stars, and Orbs: the Medieval Cosmos 1200-1687.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
Grant, Robert. History of Physical Astronomy. London: Henry G. Bohn, 1852.
Guericke. Experimenta nova. Trans. Margaret Glover Foley Ames. The new (socalled) Magdeburg experiments of Otto von Guericke / by Otto von Guericke.
Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1994.
117
Hagen, John. "Pierre Gassendi." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 6. New York:
Robert Appleton Company, 1909. Web. 2009.
<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06391b.htm>.
Halley, Edmond. Catalogus stellarum australium. 1679. Facsimile online.
Internet Archives. Web. 2009.
http://www.archive.org/stream/catalogusstella00hallgoog#page/n21/mode/
2up
Halley, Edmond. “Considerations on the Change of the Latitudes of Some of the
Principal Fixt Stars.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society.
30.355.736-738. (1718).
Harrison, Edward. Darkness at Night: a Riddle of the Universe. Cambridge MA;
London: Harvard University Press, 1987. 103; 241.
Hastie, W. Trans. “The Hamburg Account of Wright’s Theory.” Universal Natural
History and Theory of the Heavens. By Immanuel Kant. Ed. Milton Munitz. Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1969. 170-180 (Appendix).
Herschel, William. “Account of some Observations tending to investigate the
Construction of the Heavens.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society
74:437-451 (January 1, 1784).
Herschel, William. “On the Construction of the Heavens.” Philosophical
Transactions of the Royal Society 75:213-266 (January 1, 1785).
Herschel, William. “On the Proper Motion of the Sun and Solar System.”
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society 73:247-283 (January 1, 1783).
Hirshfeld, Alan. Parallax: the Race to Measure the Cosmos. New York: W.H.
Freeman, 2001.
Hoeg, Erik. “400 Years of Astrometry: from Tycho Brahe to Hipparcos.”
Contribution to the History of Astrometry. No. 8. Noordwijk: ESTC (2008):6.
Hoskin, Michael A. William Herschel and the Construction of the Heavens.
London: Oldbourne, 1963.
Huygens, Christian. The Celestial Worlds Discover’d. London: Frank Cass and
Co., 1968. (Facsimile reproduction).
Jaki, Stanley L. Trans. Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens. By
Immanuel Kant. Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1981. 22 (Introduction).
Johnson, Francis R. “The Influence of Thomas Digges on the Progress of
Modern Astronomy in XVIth century England.” Osiris 1 (1936).
Jowett, Benjamin. Republic of Plato translated into English. Oxford: Clarendon,
1908.
Kanas, Nick. Star Maps: History, Artistry, and Cartography. Berlin; New York:
Springer, 2007.
Kant, Immanuel. Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens. Trans.
Stanley L. Jaki. Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1981. 30-31 (Jaki’s
introd.); 88-90 (Kant).
Kelly, Sister Suzanne. The De Mundo of William Gilbert. Amsterdam: Menno
Hertzberger & Co., 1965.
Koyré, Alexandre. From the closed world to the infinite universe. Baltimore: The
Johns Hopkins Press, 1957. 55-57.
Lattis, James M. Between Copernicus and Galileo: Christoph Clavius and the
Collapse of Ptolemaic Cosmology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994.
“Bertil Lindblad.” Obituary notices. Quarterly Journal of the Royal
Astronomical Society. 7. (1966): 332.
Longair, M.S. The Cosmic Century: a History of Astrophysics and Cosmology.
Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2006. 83.
Lucretius. De Rerum Natura 2.1069 Trans. Ronald Latham. On the Nature of the
Universe. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1951. 91.
Magruder, Kerry V. “The idiom of a six day creation and global depictions in
118
Theories of the Earth.” Geology and Religion. Ed. Martina Kolbl-Ebert. London:
Geological Society, 2009.
Magruder, Kerry V. Home page. “Is This a Medieval Flat-Earth Woodcut?”
2003. Web. 2009. (Includes English translation not only of the caption, but of
the entire passage).
http://homepage.mac.com/kvmagruder/flatEarth/
Magruder, Kerry V. “Jesuit Science After Galileo: the Cosmology of Gabriele
Beati.” Centaurus 51. 3 (August 2009).
Moesgaard, Kristian Peder. “How Copernicanism took root in Denmark and
Norway.” The Reception of Copernicus’ Heliocentric Theory. Jerzy Dobrzycki. Ed.
Dordrecht-Holland: D. Reidel, 1972-73. 142.
Munitz, Milton. Ed. Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens. By
Immanuel Kant. Trans. W. Hastie. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press,
1969. xiv-xviii (Introduction).
Neilson, Axel V. “Ole Roemer and his Meridian Circle.” Vistas in Astronomy.
Beer. Ed. London: Pergamon Press, 1968. Vol. 10. 105-112.
Nelson, Richard. Ed. “Principle of Least Action: Maupertuis.” Cambridge
Forecast Group. 2006. Web. 2009.
Newton. Letter to Richard Bentley. MS. Newton Project. University of Sussex.
[n.d.] Web. 2009. http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk
Newton. Principia (General Scholium). Trans. Bernard Cohen and Anne
Whitman. Isaac Newton. The Principia. University of California Press, 1999.
941-942.
O'Connor, J. J. and E. F. Robertson. Georg Peurbach. School of Mathematics and
Statistics, University of St. Andrews, Scotland. August 2006. Web. 2009.
http://www.gap-system.org/~history/Biographies/Peurbach.html
O’Connor, J. J. and E.F. Robertson. Oronce Fine. School of Mathematics and
Statistics, University of St. Andrews, Scotland.September 2005. Web. 2009.
http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Fine.html
Pitts Theology Library. Digital Image Archive. N.d. Web. 2009.
http://www.pitts.emory.edu/dia/listform.cfm
Plato. Timaeus. Trans. Benjamin Jowett. The Dialogues of Plato. New York:
Random House, 1937. 2 vols. Vol. 2: 3-68.
Plato. Republic, Book X. Trans. Benjamin Jowett. The Dialogues of Plato. New
York: Random House, 1937. 2 vols. Vol. 1: 872-879.
Purves, John. Selections from the Dialogues of Plato, with preface by Jowett.
Oxford: Clarendon, 1883.
Remmert, Volker. “Picturing Jesuit anti-Copernican Consensus: astronomy and
biblical exegesis in the engraved title-page of Clavius’ Opera mathematica.”
Jesuits II: Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts, 1540-1773. Toronto: University of
Toronto Press. 2006. 301-304.
Roemer, Ole. “Demonstration touchant le movement de la lumiere.” Journal
des Scavans. December 7, 1676.)
Roger, Jacques. “The mechanistic conception of life.” God & Nature. Ed. David
Lindberg. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986. 280.
Saiber, Arielle. “Ornamental Flourishes in Giordano Bruno’s Geometry.”
Sixteenth Century Journal 34. 3 (2003).
Schechner, Sara J. Comets, Popular Culture and the Birth of Modern Cosmology.
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999. 111.
Schettino, Ernesto. “The Necessity of the Minima in the Nolan Philosophy.”
Giordano Bruno, Philosopher of the Renaissance. Ed. Hilary Gatti. Hants,
England: Ashgate, 2002. 313
Short, John R. Making Space: Revisioning the World 1475-1600. Syracuse
University Press, 2004. 42-44. Web (Google Books, accessed 2009).
Sidgwick, John B. William Herschel: Explorer of the Heavens. London: Faber
and Faber, 1953.
119
Taton, Rene and Curtis Wilson. Planetary astronomy from the Renaissance to
the rise of astrophysics. Cambridge University Press, 1989.
Thorndike, Lynn. A History of Magic and Experimental Science. New York:
Columbia University Press, 1941. 8 vols.
About the Exhibit
This exhibition was made possible by generous support from
Mr. & Mrs. James B. Hebenstreit and Mrs. Lathrop M. Gates.
Toomer, G. J., transl. Ptolemy’s Almagest. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1984.
Van Helden, Albert. Measuring the Universe: Cosmic Dimensions from
Aristarchus to Halley. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985.
Thinking Outside the Sphere at the Linda Hall Library
Exhibition Credits
Van Helden, Albert. “Guericke, Otto von.” Galileo Project. Rice University.
1995. Web. 2009. http://galileo.rice.edu/Catalog/NewFiles/guericke.html
This ecatalog was written and prepared by Cynthia J. Rogers, Curator.
Van Nouhuys, Tabbitta. The age of two-faced Janus: the Comets of 1577 and
1618. Leiden: Brill, 1998. 85. Web (Google Books).
Volk, O. “Remarks about the History of Celestial Mechanics.” Celestial
Mechanics 2. 3 (1970): 431.
Webb, Stephen. Measuring the Universe: the Cosmological Distance Ladder.
Chichester UK: Praxis Publishing, 1999.
Whitrow, G.J. “Kant and the Extragalactic Nebulae.” Colloquium on Historical
Aspects of Astronomy. University of Exeter, 1966. 50-55.
Exhibit advisors were William B. Ashworth, Jr. and Bruce Bradley.
The exhibit was prepared and installed at the Linda Hall Library by Bruce Bradley
and Nancy Officer.
Graphic elements for the exhibit web site, the exhibition panels, the Gallery Guide
and other print materials were designed by Nancy V. Green with Jon Rollins.
Images for the exhibition were digitized by Nancy V. Green, Jon Rollins, and Sally
Crosson of the Digital Projects Department.
Wright, Thomas. An Original Theory or New Hypothesis of the Universe. 1750.
Facsimile reprint. Ed. Michael A. Hoskin. London: Macdonald and Co., 1971.
Yates, Frances A. Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1964.
Youschkevitch, A. P. “Euler, Leonhard.” Dictionary of Scientific Biography.
New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1971.
Aegidius Strauch. Astrognosia, 1659.
120
Linda Hall Library
of Science, Engineering & Technolog
5109 Cherry Street
Kansas City, MO 64110
USA
www.lindahall.org
121