HISTORY OF

ASTRONOMY

Padua, Anne Jhelu C.

HUMSS11-A SCI101
 3114 BC
 -Mayan Astronomers discovered an 18.7-year cycle in the rising and settling in the moon.
-First Almanacs were created.
-These was used to predict eclipses.
 585 BC
-Thales of Miletus predicts a solar eclipse.
 467 BC
-Anaxagoras produced a correct explanation for eclipses and then described the Sun as a fiery
mass larger than the Peloponnese , as well as attempting to explain rainbows and meteors. The
first Greek philosopher to explain that the Moon shines due to reflected light from the Sun.
 400 BC
-Babylonians used the zodiac to divide the heavens into twelve equal segments of thirty degrees
each to record and communicate information about the position of celestial bodies.
 387 BC
-Plato founds the Platonic academy that promotes the idea that everything in the universe moves
in harmony.
 270 BC
-Aristarchus of Samos proposes heliocentrism as an alternative to the Earth-centred universe.
 240 BC
-The earliest recorded sighting of Halley's Comet is made by Chinese astronomers.
 150 BC
-Hipparchus of Nicaea calculates the first model of the solar system based on trigonometry and
determines the precession of the equinoxes.
 6 BC
-The Magi - probably Persian astronomers/astrologers observed a planetary conjunction on
Saturday (Sabbath) April 17, 6 BC that signified the birth of a great Hebrew king: Jesus.
 4 BC
-The astronomer Shi Shen is believed to have cataloged 809 stars in 122 constellations, and he
also made the earliest known observation of sunspots.
 140
-Ptolemy publishes his star catalogue, listing 48 constellations and endorses the geocentric view
of the universe. These were passed down to Arabic and medieval European astronomers in his
book the Almagest.
 400
-The Hindu cosmological time cycles explained in the Surya Siddhanta, give the average length
of the sidereal year and remains the most accurate estimate for the length of the sidereal year
anywhere in the world for over a thousand years.
 499
-The book Aryabhatiya first identifies the force gravity to explain why objects do not fall when
the Earth rotates, propounds a geocentric Solar System of gravitation, and an eccentric elliptical
model of the planets, where the planets spin on their axis and follow elliptical orbits, the Sun and
the Moon revolve around the Earth in epicycles. He also writes that the planets and the Moon do
not have their own light but reflect the light of the Sun and that the Earth rotates on its axis
causing day and night and also that the Sun rotates around the Earth causing years.
 628
-The book Brahma-Sphuta-Siddhanta, first recognizes gravity as a force of attraction, and briefly
describes the second law of Newton's law of universal gravitation. He gives methods for
 calculations of the motions and places of various planets, their rising and setting, conjunctions,
and calculations of the solar and lunar eclipses.
 773
-The Sanskrit works of Aryabhata and Brahmagupta, along with the Sanskrit text Surya
Siddhanta, are translated into Arabic, introducing Arabic astronomers to Indian astronomy.
 830
-The Zij al-Sindh by al-Khwarizimi contains tables for the movements of the Sun, the Moon, and
the five planets known at the time. The work is significant as it introduced Ptolemaic concepts
into Islamic sciences.
-Marks the turning point in Arabic astronomy and marked the beginning of nontraditional
methods of study and calculations.
 850
-The Kitab fi Jawani ("A compendium of the science of stars") primarily gave a summary of
Ptolemic cosmography. However, it also corrected Ptolemy based on findings of earlier Arab
astronomers.
-Al-Farghani who wrote Kitab fi Jawani gave revised values for the obliquity of the ecliptic, the
precessional movement of the apogees of the Sun and the Moon, and the circumference of the
Earth.
 928
-Astrolabes are the most advanced instruments of their time which constructed by Islamic
mathematician–astronomer Mohammad al-Fazari.
 1030
-Abū Rayḥān al-Bīrūnī discussed the Indian heliocentric theories of Aryabhata, Brahmagupta and
Varāhamihira in his Ta'rikh al-Hind (Indica in Latin). Biruni stated that the followers of
Aryabhata consider the Earth to be at the center.
 1031
-Abu Sa'id al-Sijzi, a contemporary of Abu Rayhan Biruni, defended the theory that Earth
revolves around its axis.
 1054
-Chinese astronomers record the sudden appearance of a bright star.
-Native-American rock carvings also show the brilliant star close to the Moon. This star is the
Crab supernova exploding.
 1070
-Abu Ubayd al-Juzjani published the Tarik al-Aflak. In his work, he indicated the so-called
"equant" problem of the Ptolemic model.
-Al-Juzjani proposed a solution to the problem.
-One of the most important works in the period was Al-Shuku ala Batlamyus ("Doubts on
Ptolemy"). In this, the author summed up the inconsistencies of the Ptolemic models.
 1126
-Islamic and Indian astronomical works (including Aryabhatiya and Brahma-Sphuta-Siddhanta)
are translated into Latin in Córdoba, Spain in 1126, introducing European astronomers to Islamic
and Indian astronomy.
 1150
-Indian mathematician-astronomer Bhāskara II, in his Siddhanta Shiromani, calculates the
longitudes and latitudes of the planets, lunar and solar eclipses, risings and settings, the Moon's
lunar crescent, syzygies, and conjunctions of the planets with each other and with the fixed stars,
and explains the three problems of diurnal rotation. He also calculates the planetary mean motion,
 ellipses, first visibilities of the planets, the lunar crescent, the seasons, and the length of the
Earth's revolution around the Sun to 9 decimal places.
 1190
-Al-Bitruji proposed an alternative geocentric system to Ptolemy's. He also declared the
Ptolemaic system as mathematical, and not physical.
-His alternative system spread through most of Europe during the 13th century, with debates and
refutations of his ideas continued to the 16th century.
 1250
-His alternative system spread through most of Europe during the 13th century, with debates and
refutations of his ideas continued to the 16th century.
-Nasir al-Din al-Tusi resolved significant problems in the Ptolemaic system by developing the
Tusi-couple as an alternative to the physically problematic equant introduced by Ptolemy. His
Tusi-couple is later used in the Copernican model.
-Tusi's student Qutb al-Din al-Shirazi, in his The Limit of Accomplishment concerning
Knowledge of the Heavens, discusses the possibility of heliocentrism.
-Najm al-Din al-Qazwini al-Katibi, who also worked at the Maraghah observatory, in his Hikmat
al-'Ain, wrote an argument for a heliocentric model, though he later abandoned the idea.
 1350
-A Final Inquiry Concerning the Rectification of Planetary Theory, eliminated the need for an
equant by introducing an extra epicycle, departing from the Ptolemaic system in a way very
similar to what Copernicus later also did.
-Ibn al-Shatir proposed a system that was only approximately geocentric, rather than exactly so,
having demonstrated trigonometrically that the Earth was not the exact center of the universe.
-His rectification was later used in the Copernican model.
 1543
-Nicolaus Copernicus publishes De revolutionibus orbium coelestium containing his theory that
Earth travels around the Sun. However, he complicates his theory by retaining Plato's perfect
circular orbits of the planets.
 1572
-A brilliant supernova (SN 1572 - thought, at the time, to be a comet) is observed by Tycho
Brahe, who proves that it is traveling beyond Earth's atmosphere and therefore provides the first
evidence that the heavens can change.
 1608
-Dutch eyeglass maker Hans Lippershey tries to patent a refracting telescope (the first historical
record of one). The invention spreads rapidly across Europe, as scientists make their own
instruments.
-The discoveries of the scientists began a revolution in astronomy.
 1609
-Johannes Kepler publishes his New Astronomy.
 1610
-Galileo Galilei publishes Sidereus Nuncius describing the findings of his observations with the
telescope he built.
 1655
-The power and the quality of the telescopes increase.
-Christiaan Huygens studies Saturn and discovers its largest satellite, Titan. He also explains
Saturn's appearance, suggesting the planet is surrounded by a thin ring.
 1663
 -Scottish astronomer James Gregory describes his "gregorian" reflecting telescope, using
parabolic mirrors instead of lenses to reduce chromatic aberration and spherical aberration, but is
unable to build one.
 1668
-Isaac Newton builds the first reflecting telescope, his Newtonian telescope.
 1687
-Isaac Newton publishes his first copy of the book Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica,
establishing the theory of gravitation and laws of motion.
 1705
-Edmond Halley calculates that the comets recorded at 76-year intervals from 1456 to 1682 are
one and the same. He predicts that the comet will return again in 1758. When it reappears as
expected, the comet is named in his honor.
 1750
-French astronomer Nicolas de Lacaille sails to southern oceans and begins work compiling a
catalog of more than 10000 stars in the southern sky.
 1781
-Amateur astronomer William Herschel discovers the planet Uranus.
 1784
-Charles Messier publishes his catalog of star clusters and nebulas.
 1800
-William Herschel splits sunlight through a prism and with a thermometer, measures the energy
given out by different colours. He notices a sudden increase in energy beyond the red end of the
spectrum, discovering invisible infrared and laying the foundations of spectroscopy.
 1801
-Italian astronomer Giuseppe Piazzi discovers what appears to be a new planet orbiting between
Mars and Jupiter, and names it Ceres.
-William Herschel proves it is a very small object, calculating it to be only 320 km in diameter,
and not a planet. He proposes the name asteroid, and soon other similar bodies are being found.
 1814
-Joseph von Fraunhofer builds the first accurate spectrometer and uses it to study the spectrum of
the Sun's light.
 1838
-Friedrich Bessel successfully uses the method of stellar parallax, the effect of Earth's annual
movement around the Sun, to calculate the distance to 61 Cygni, the first star other than the Sun
to have its distance from Earth measured.
 1843
-German amateur astronomer Heinrich Schwabe, who has been studying the Sun for the past 17
years, announces his discovery of a regular cycle in sunspot numbers - the first clue to the Sun's
internal structure.
 1845
-Irish astronomer William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse completes the first of the world's great
telescopes, with a 180-cm mirror. He uses it to study and draw the structure of nebulas, and
within a few months discovers the spiral structure of the Whirlpool Galaxy.
-French physicists Jean Foucault and Armand Fizeau take the first detailed photographs of the
Sun's surface through a telescope - the birth of scientific astrophotography.
 1846
 -A new planet, Neptune, is identified by German astronomer Johann Gottfried Galle while
searching in the position suggested by Urbain Le Verrier.
-Le Verrier has calculated the position and size of the planet from the effects of its gravitational
pull on the orbit of Uranus. An English mathematician, John Couch Adams, also made a similar
calculation a year earlier.
 1868
-Astronomers notice a new bright emission line in the spectrum of the Sun's atmosphere during an
eclipse.
 1872
-An American astronomer Henry Draper takes the first photograph of the spectrum of a star
(Vega), showing absorption lines that reveal its chemical makeup.
 1901
-A comprehensive survey of stars, the Henry Draper Catalogue, is published.
 1906
-Ejnar Hertzsprung establishes the standard for measuring the true brightness of a star. He shows
that there is a relationship between color and absolute magnitude for 90% of the stars in the
Milky Way Galaxy.
 1910
-Williamina Fleming publishes her discovery of white dwarf stars.
 1912
-Henrietta Swan Leavitt discovers the period-luminosity relation for Cepheid variables, whereas
the brightness of a star is proportional to its luminosity oscillation period. It opened a whole new
branch of possibilities of measuring distances on the universe, and this discovery was the basis
for the work done by Edwin Hubble on extragalactic astronomy.
 1916
-German physicist Karl Schwarzschild uses Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity to lay the
groundwork for black hole theory.
 1923
-Edwin Hubble discovers a Cepheid variable star in the "Andromeda Nebula" and proves that
Andromeda and other nebulas are galaxies far beyond our own.
 1925
-Edwin Hubble produces a classification system for galaxies.
-Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin discovers that hydrogen is the most abundant element in the Sun's
atmosphere, and accordingly, the most abundant element in the universe by relating the spectral
classes of stars to their actual temperatures and by applying the ionization theory developed by
Indian physicist Meghnad Saha. This opens the path for the study of stellar atmospheres and
chemical abundances, contributing to understand the chemical evolution of the universe.
 1929
-Edwin Hubble discovered that the universe is expanding and that the farther away a galaxy is,
the faster it is moving away from us.
 1930
-Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar predicts that the atoms in a white dwarf star of more than 1.44
solar masses will disintegrate, causing the star to collapse violently.
-Clyde Tombaugh discovers the dwarf planet Pluto at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff,
Arizona.
 1932
-Karl Jansky detects the first radio waves coming from space.
 1938
-German physicist Hans Bethe explains how stars generate energy.
 1948
- The largest telescope in the world, with a 5.08m (200 in) mirror, is completed at Palomar
Mountain in California. At the time, the telescope pushes single-mirror telescope technology to
its limits - large mirrors tend to bend under their own weight.
 1958
- July 29 marks the beginning of the NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration),
agency newly created by the United States to catch up with Soviet space technologies. It absorbs
all research centers and staffs of the NACA (National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics), an
organization founded in 1915.
 1959
- Russia and the US both launch probes to the Moon, but NASA's Pioneer probes all failed. The
Russian Luna program was more successful. Luna 2 crash-lands on the Moon's surface in
September, and Luna 3 returns the first pictures of the Moon's farside in October.

 1960
- Cornell University astronomer Frank Drake performed the first modern SETI experiment,
named "Project Ozma", after the Queen of Oz in L. Frank Baum's fantasy books.
 1962
-Mariner 2 becomes the first probe to reach another planet, flying past Venus in December.
 1963
-Dutch-American astronomer Maarten Schmidt measures the spectra of quasars, the mysterious
star-like radio sources discovered in 1960. He establishes that quasars are active galaxies, and
among the most distant objects in the universe.
 1965
-Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson announce the discovery of a weak radio signal coming from all
parts of the sky. Scientists figure out that this must be emitted by an object at a temperature of
-270 °C. Soon it is recognized as the remnant of the very hot radiation from the Big Bang that
created the universe 13 billion years ago, see Cosmic microwave background. This radio signal is
emitted by the electron in hydrogen flipping from pointing up or down and is approximated to
happen once in a million years for every particle. Hydrogen is present in interstellar space gas
throughout the entire universe and most dense in nebulae which is where the signals originate.
Even though the electron of hydrogen only flips once every million years the mere quantity of
hydrogen in space gas makes the presence of these radio waves prominent.
 1966
-Russian Luna 9 probe makes the first successful soft landing on the Moon in January, while the
US lands the far more complex Surveyor missions, which follows up to NASA's Ranger series of
crash-landers, scout sites for possible manned landings.
 1967
-Jocelyn Bell Burnell and Antony Hewish detected the first pulsar, an object emitting regular
pulses of radio waves. Pulsars are eventually recognized as rapidly spinning neutron stars with
intense magnetic fields - the remains of a supernova explosion.
 1970
- The Uhuru satellite, designed to map the sky at X-ray wavelengths, is launched by NASA. The
existence of X-rays from the Sun and a few other stars has already been found using rocket-
 launched experiments, but Uhuru charts more than 300 X-ray sources, including several possible
black holes.
 1972
- Charles Thomas Bolton was the first astronomer to present irrefutable evidence of the existence
of a black hole.
 1975
- The Russian probe Venera 9 lands on the surface of Venus and sends back the first picture of its
surface. The first probe to land on another planet, Venera 7 in 1970, had no camera. Both break
down within an hour in the hostile atmosphere.

 1976
- NASA's Viking 1 and Viking 2 space probes arrive at Mars. Each Viking mission consists of an
orbiter, which photographs the planet from above, and a lander, which touches down on the
surface, analyzes the rocks, and searches unsuccessfully for life.

 1977
- On August 20 the Voyager 2 space probe launched by NASA to study the Jovian system,
Saturnian system, Uranian system, Neptunian system, the Kuiper belt, the heliosphere and the
interstellar space.
- On September 5 The Voyager 1 space probe launched by NASA to study the Jovian system,
Saturnian system and the interstellar medium.
 1983
- The first infrared astronomy satellite, IRAS, is launched. It must be cooled to extremely low
temperatures with liquid helium, and it operates for only 300 days before the supply of helium is
exhausted. During this time it completes an infrared survey of 98% of the sky.

 1986
- The returning Halley's Comet is met by a fleet of five probes from Russia, Japan, and Europe.
The most ambitious is the European Space Agency's Giotto spacecraft, which flies through the
comet's coma and photographs the nucleus.

 1990
- The Magellan probe, launched by NASA, arrives at Venus and spends three years mapping the
planet with radar. Magellan is the first in a new wave of probes that include Galileo, which
arrives at Jupiter in 1995, and Cassini which arrives at Saturn in 2004.
- The Hubble Space Telescope, the first large optical telescope in orbit, is launched using the
Space Shuttle, but astronomers soon discovered that it is crippled by a problem with its mirror. A
complex repair mission in 1993 allows the telescope to start producing spectacular images of
distant stars, nebulae, and galaxies.
 1992
-The Cosmic Background Explorer satellite produces a detailed map of the background radiation
remaining from the Big Bang. The map shows "ripples", caused by slight variations in the density
of the early universe – the seeds of galaxies and galaxy clusters.
- The 10-meter Keck telescope on Mauna Kea, Hawaii, is completed. The first revolutionary new
wave of telescopes, the Keck's main mirror is made of 36 six-sided segments, with computers to
control their alignment. New optical telescopes also make use of interferometry – improving
resolution by combining images from separate telescopes.
 1995
-The first exoplanet, 51 Pegasi b, is discovered by Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz.
 2005
- Mike Brown and his team discovered Eris a large body in the outer Solar System which was
temporarily named as (2003) UB313. Initially, it appeared larger than Pluto and was called the
tenth planet.
 2006
- International Astronomical Union (IAU) adopted a new definition of planet. A new distinct
class of objects called dwarf planets was also decided. Pluto was redefined as a dwarf planet
along with Ceres and Eris, formerly known as (2003) UB313. Eris was named after the IAU
General Assembly in 2006.
 2008
- 2008 TC3 becomes the first Earth-impacting meteoroid spotted and tracked prior to impact.
 2012
- (May 2) First visual proof of the existence of black holes is published. Suvi Gezari's team in
Johns Hopkins University, using the Hawaiian telescope Pan-STARRS 1, record images of a
supermassive black hole 2.7 million light-years away that is swallowing a red giant.

 2013
In October 2013, the first extrasolar asteroid is detected around white dwarf star GD 61. It is also
the first detected extrasolar body which contains water in liquid or solid form.

 2015
On July 14, with the successful encounter of Pluto by NASA's New Horizons spacecraft, the
United States became the first nation to explore all of the nine major planets recognized in 1981.
Later on September 14, LIGO was the first to directly detect gravitational waves.

 2016
Exoplanet Proxima Centauri b is discovered around Proxima Centauri by the European Southern
Observatory, making it the closest known exoplanet to the Solar System as of 2016.

 2017
In August 2017, a neutron star collision that occurred in the galaxy NGC 4993 produced the
gravitational wave signal GW170817, which was observed by the LIGO/Virgo collaboration.
After 1.7 seconds, it was observed as the gamma-ray burst GRB 170817A by the Fermi Gamma-
ray Space Telescope and INTEGRAL, and its optical counterpart SSS17a was detected 11 hours
later at the Las Campanas Observatory. Further optical observations e.g. by the Hubble Space
Telescope and the Dark Energy Camera, ultraviolet observations by the Swift Gamma-Ray Burst
Mission, X-ray observations by the Chandra X-ray Observatory and radio observations by the
Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array complemented the detection. This was the first instance of a
gravitational wave event that was observed to have a simultaneous electromagnetic signal,
thereby marking a significant breakthrough for multi-messenger astronomy. Non-observation of
neutrinos is attributed to the jets being strongly off-axis.

 2019
China's Chang'e 4 became the first spacecraft to perform a soft landing on the lunar far side.
 In April 2019, the Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration obtained the first image of a black hole
which was at the center of galaxy M87, providing more evidence for the existence of
supermassive black holes in accordance with general relativity.

India launched its second lunar probe called Chandrayaan 2 with an orbiter that was successful
and a lander called Vikram along with a rover called Pragyan which failed just 2.1 km above the
lunar south pole.

 2020
NASA launches Mars 2020 to Mars with a Mars rover that was named Perseverance by seventh
grader Alexander Mather in a naming contest