Related papers: Boscovich and the Brera Observatory
In 2015 the Institute of Physics and Astronomy of the Universidad de Valpara\'iso in Chile received as a donation the Bochum 0.61-meter telescope. Here we preset the ongoing project to convert this senior member of La Silla Observatory to…
It has been generally accepted that the originators of the double star astronomy were Christian Mayer and William Herschel. We recovered the memory of the poorly known Italian astronomer Giovanni Battista Hodierna, who published the first…
A re-investigation of the parapegma of Euktemon (5th century BC, Athens), based on the assumption that some star observations may in fact have been calculated rather than directly observed. The calculation follows Pliny, Natural History…
Near the end of the 16th century Wilhelm IV, Landgraf von Hessen-Kassel, set up an observatory with the main goal to increase the accuracy of stellar positions primarily for use in astrology and for calendar purposes. A new star catalogue…
At the end of the 17th century, the collection was established through the acquisition of Leiden instrumentmaker Musschenbroek's collection. Its aim was to demonstrate physical phenomena. Until the end of the 18th century, the collection…
Gerbert of Aurillac was Pope Sylvester II form 999 to 1003. His history is presented in order to understand his outstanding contribution in the establishment of quadrivium sciences (arithmetics, music, geometry and astronomy) in the…
Solar meridian observations have been used to evaluate the solar activity of the past. Some important examples are the solar meridian observations made at the Basilica of San Petronio in Bologna by several astronomers and the observations…
In 1839 Ebenezer Porter Mason (1819-1840) produced detailed drawings of the Omega Nebula (M17), the Trifid Nebula (M20) and the eastern part of the Veil Nebula (NGC 6992 and 6995). He used a 12-inch (30 cm) reflector that he and his friends…
Joseph-Nicolas Delisle was one of the most important scientists at the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences during the first period when Euler was working there. Euler was helping him in his work on astronomy and in geography. In this…
What astronomer could not use his own surname because his father was beheaded for sorcery? Who built the only observatory worth $5 billion in today's money? Who had worse luck than YOU travelling thousands of miles NOT to observe an…
Annual astrological calendars, practica and prognostications became widespread publications in Europe after the invention of printing presses in the 15th century. Using the national language instead of Latin, the language of the scientists,…
In 1492, for the first time, an unknown ocean opened up before sailors: weeks of navigation and no idea how to pinpoint their location. Since ancient times, navigators had known how to determine latitude by using the North Star, but the…
In no other epoch of Western history like in the Middle Ages, cosmology was so key an element of culture and, one way or another, the motion of the heavens ended up impregnating the literature of that time. Among the most noteworthy poets…
When V. M. Slipher gave the 1933 George Darwin lecture to the Royal Astronomical Society, it was natural that he spoke on spectrographic studies of planets. Less than one-sixth of his published work deals with globular clusters and the…
The Swiss Federal Observatory, which had been founded in 1863 by Rudolf Wolf, was dissolved in connection with the retirement of Max Waldmeier in 1979. The determination of the Zurich sunpot number, which had been a cornerstone activity of…
Eric H. Strach (1914-2011) studied medicine at University of Prague and graduated in 1938. Strach dedicated a great part of his life to astronomy becoming a consistent and meticulous observer. He joined the Liverpool Astronomical…
During the second half of the twentieth century, expensive observatories are being erected at La Silla (Chile), Mauna Kea (Hawai), Las Palmas (Canary Island), and Calar Alto (Spain), to name a view. In 1990, at the beginning of The Decade…
During the first few centuries CE, the centre of the known world gradually shifted from Alexandria to Constantinople. Combined with a societal shift from pagan beliefs to Christian doctrines, Antiquity gave way to the Byzantine era. While…
A new spectrograph (FIASCO) is in operation at the 0.9m telescope of the University Observatory Jena. This article describes the characterization of the instrument and reports its first astronomical observations, among those Li (670.8nm)…
We present a translation of the German text of an 1874 article by Valentin Rose that concerns the possible school of translators that worked in Toledo, Spain, from about 1150 to 1250. Rose's article relies significantly on the first-hand…