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ОглавлениеFig. 17.—The eccentric.
This problem was much more difficult than might at first sight appear, on account of the great difficulty experienced in Greek times and long afterwards in getting satisfactory observations of the sun. As the sun and stars are not visible at the same time, it is not possible to measure directly the distance of the sun from neighbouring stars and so to fix its place on the celestial sphere. But it is possible, by measuring the length of the shadow cast by a rod at midday, to ascertain with fair accuracy the height of the sun above the horizon, and hence to deduce its distance from the equator, or the declination (figs. 3, 14). This one quantity does not suffice to fix the sun’s position, but if also the sun’s right ascension (§33), or its distance east and west from the stars, can be accurately ascertained, its place on the celestial sphere is completely determined. The methods available for determining this second quantity were, however, very imperfect. One method was to note the time between the passage of the sun across some fixed position in the sky (e.g. the meridian), and the passage of a star across the same place, and thus to ascertain the angular distance between them (the celestial sphere being known to turn through 15° in an hour), a method which with modern clocks is extremely accurate, but with the rough water-clocks or sand-glasses of former times was very uncertain. In another method the moon was used as a connecting link between sun and stars, her position relative to the latter being observed by night, and with respect to the former by day; but owing to the rapid motion of the moon in the interval between the two observations, this method also was not susceptible of much accuracy.
Fig. 18.—The position of the sun’s apogee.
In the case of the particular problem of the determination of the line of apses, Hipparchus made use of another method, and his skill is shewn in a striking manner by his recognition that both the eccentricity and position of the apse line could be determined from a knowledge of the lengths of two of the seasons of the year, i.e. of the intervals into which the year is divided by the solstices and the equinoxes (§11). By means of his own observations, and of others made by his predecessors, he ascertained the length of the spring (from the vernal equinox to the summer solstice) to be 94 days, and that of the summer (summer solstice to autumnal equinox) to be 92-1∕2 days, the length of the year being 365-1∕4 days. As the sun moves in each season through the same angular distance, a right angle, and as the spring and summer make together more than half the year, and the spring is longer than the summer, it follows that the sun must, on the whole, be moving more slowly during the spring than in any other season, and that it must therefore pass through the apogee in the spring. If, therefore, in fig. 18, we draw two perpendicular lines Q E S, P E R to represent the directions of the sun at the solstices and equinoxes, P corresponding to the vernal equinox and R to the autumnal equinox, the apogee must lie at some point A between P and Q. So much can be seen without any mathematics: the actual calculation of the position of A and of the eccentricity is a matter of some complexity. The angle P E A was found to be about 65°, so that the sun would pass through its apogee about the beginning of June; and the eccentricity was estimated at 1∕24.
The motion being thus represented geometrically, it became merely a matter of not very difficult calculation to construct a table from which the position of the sun for any day in the year could be easily deduced. This was done by computing the so-called equation of the centre, the angle C S E of fig. 17, which is the excess of the actual longitude of the sun over the longitude which it would have had if moving uniformly.
Owing to the imperfection of the observations used (Hipparchus estimated that the times of the equinoxes and solstices could only be relied upon to within about half a day), the actual results obtained were not, according to modern ideas, very accurate, but the theory represented the sun’s motion with an accuracy about as great as that of the observations. It is worth noticing that with the same theory, but with an improved value of the eccentricity, the motion of the sun can be represented so accurately that the error never exceeds about 1′, a quantity insensible to the naked eye.
The theory of Hipparchus represents the variations in the distance of the sun with much less accuracy, and whereas in fact the angular diameter of the sun varies by about 1∕30th part of itself, or by about 1′ in the course of the year, this variation according to Hipparchus should be about twice as great. But this error would also have been quite imperceptible with his instruments.
Fig. 19.—The epicycle and the deferent.
Hipparchus saw that the motion of the sun could equally well be represented by the other device suggested by Apollonius, the epicycle. The body the motion of which is to be represented is supposed to move uniformly round the circumference of one circle, called the epicycle, the centre of which in turn moves on another circle called the deferent. It is in fact evident that if a circle equal to the eccentric, but with its centre at E (fig. 19), be taken as the deferent, and if S′ be taken on this so that E S′ is parallel to C S, then S′ S is parallel and equal to E C; and that therefore the sun S, moving uniformly on the eccentric, may equally well be regarded as lying on a circle of radius S′ S, the centre S′ of which moves on the deferent. The two constructions lead in fact in this particular problem to exactly the same result, and Hipparchus chose the eccentric as being the simpler.
40. The motion of the moon being much more complicated than that of the sun has always presented difficulties to astronomers,23 and Hipparchus required for it a more elaborate construction. Some further description of the moon’s motion is, however, necessary before discussing his theory.
We have already spoken (chapter I., §16) of the lunar month as the period during which the moon returns to the same position with respect to the sun; more precisely this period (about 29-1∕2 days) is spoken of as a lunation or synodic month: as, however, the sun moves eastward on the celestial sphere like the moon but more slowly, the moon returns to the same position with respect to the stars in a somewhat shorter time; this period (about 27 days 8 hours) is known as the sidereal month. Again, the moon’s path on the celestial sphere is slightly inclined to the ecliptic, and may be regarded approximately as a great circle cutting the ecliptic in two nodes, at an angle which Hipparchus was probably the first to fix definitely at about 5°. Moreover, the moon’s path is always changing in such a way that, the inclination to the ecliptic remaining nearly constant (but cf. chapter V., §111), the nodes move slowly backwards (from east to west) along the ecliptic, performing a complete revolution in about 19 years. It is therefore convenient to give a special name, the draconitic month,24 to the period (about 27 days 5 hours) during which the moon returns to the same position with respect to the nodes.
Again, the motion of the moon, like that of the sun, is not uniform, the variations being greater than in the case of the sun. Hipparchus appears to have been the first to discover that the part of the moon’s path in which the motion is most rapid is not always in the same position on the celestial sphere, but moves continuously; or, in other words, that the line of apses (§39) of the moon’s path moves. The motion is an advance, and a complete circuit is described in about nine years. Hence arises a fourth kind of month, the anomalistic month, which is the period in which the moon returns to apogee or perigee.
To Hipparchus is due the credit of fixing with greater exactitude than before the lengths of each of these months. In order to determine them with accuracy he recognised the importance of comparing observations of the moon taken at as great a distance of time as possible, and saw that the most satisfactory results could be obtained by using Chaldaean and other eclipse observations, which, as eclipses only take place near the moon’s nodes, were simultaneous records of the position of the moon, the nodes, and the sun.
To represent this complicated set of motions, Hipparchus used, as in the case of the sun, an eccentric, the centre of which described a circle round the earth in about nine years (corresponding to the motion of the apses), the plane of the eccentric being inclined to the ecliptic at an angle of 5°, and sliding back, so as to represent the motion of the nodes already described.
The result cannot, however, have been as satisfactory as in the case of the sun. The variation in the rate at which the moon moves is not only greater than in the case of the sun, but follows a less simple law, and cannot be adequately represented by means of a single eccentric; so that though Hipparchus’ work would have represented the motion of the moon in certain parts of her orbit with fair accuracy, there must necessarily have been elsewhere discrepancies between the calculated and observed places. There is some indication that Hipparchus was aware of these, but was not able to reconstruct his theory so as to account for them.
41. In the case of the planets Hipparchus found so small a supply of satisfactory observations by his predecessors, that he made no attempt to construct a system of epicycles or eccentrics to represent their motion, but collected fresh observations for the use of his successors. He also made use of these observations to determine with more accuracy than before the average times of revolution of the several planets.
Fig. 20.—The eclipse method of connecting the distances of the sun and moon.
He also made a satisfactory estimate of the size and distance of the moon, by an eclipse method, the leading idea of which was due to Aristarchus (§32); by observing the angular diameter of the earth’s shadow (Q R) at the distance of the moon at the time of an eclipse, and comparing it with the known angular diameters of the sun and moon, he obtained, by a simple calculation,25 a relation between the distances of the sun and moon, which gives either when the other is known. Hipparchus knew that the sun was very much more distant than the moon, and appears to have tried more than one distance, that of Aristarchus among them, and the result obtained in each case shewed that the distance of the moon was nearly 59 times the radius of the earth. Combining the estimates of Hipparchus and Aristarchus, we find the distance of the sun to be about 1,200 times the radius of the earth—a number which remained substantially unchanged for many centuries (chapter VIII., §161).
42. The appearance in 134 B.C. of a new star in the Scorpion is said to have suggested to Hipparchus the construction of a new catalogue of the stars. He included 1,080 stars, and not only gave the (celestial) latitude and longitude of each star, but divided them according to their brightness into six magnitudes. The constellations to which he refers are nearly identical with those of Eudoxus (§26), and the list has undergone few alterations up to the present day, except for the addition of a number of southern constellations, invisible in the civilised countries of the ancient world. Hipparchus recorded also a number of cases in which three or more stars appeared to be in line with one another, or, more exactly, lay on the same great circle, his object being to enable subsequent observers to detect more easily possible changes in the positions of the stars. The catalogue remained, with slight alterations, the standard one for nearly sixteen centuries (cf. chapter III., §63).
The construction of this catalogue led to a notable discovery, the best known probably of all those which Hipparchus made. In comparing his observations of certain stars with those of Timocharis and Aristyllus (§33), made about a century and a half earlier, Hipparchus found that their distances from the equinoctial points had changed. Thus, in the case of the bright star Spica, the distance from the equinoctial points (measured eastwards) had increased by about 2° in 150 years, or at the rate of 48″ per annum. Further inquiry showed that, though the roughness of the observations produced considerable variations in the case of different stars, there was evidence of a general increase in the longitude of the stars (measured from west to east), unaccompanied by any change of latitude, the amount of the change being estimated by Hipparchus as at least 36″ annually, and possibly more. The agreement between the motions of different stars was enough to justify him in concluding that the change could be accounted for, not as a motion of individual stars, but rather as a change in the position of the equinoctial points, from which longitudes were measured. Now these points are the intersection of the equator and the ecliptic: consequently one or another of these two circles must have changed. But the fact that the latitudes of the stars had undergone no change shewed that the ecliptic must have retained its position and that the change had been caused by a motion of the equator. Again, Hipparchus measured the obliquity of the ecliptic as several of his predecessors had done, and the results indicated no appreciable change. Hipparchus accordingly inferred that the equator was, as it were, slowly sliding backwards (i.e. from east to west), keeping a constant inclination to the ecliptic.
Fig. 21.—The increase of the longitude of a star.
The argument may be made clearer by figures. In fig. 21 let ♈ M denote the ecliptic, ♈ N the equator, S a star as seen by Timocharis, S M a great circle drawn perpendicular to the ecliptic. Then S M is the latitude, ♈ M the longitude. Let S′ denote the star as seen by Hipparchus; then he found, that S′ M was equal to the former S M, but that ♈ M′ was greater than the former ♈ M, or that M′ was slightly to the east of M. This change M M′ being nearly the same for all stars, it was simpler to attribute it to an equal motion in the opposite direction of the point ♈, say from ♈ to ♈′ (fig. 22), i.e. by a motion of the equator from ♈ N to ♈′ N′, its inclination N′ ♈′ M remaining equal to its former amount N ♈ M. The general effect of this change is shewn in a different way in fig. 23, where ♈ ♈′ ♎ ♎′ being the ecliptic, A B C D represents the equator as it appeared in the time of Timocharis, A′ B′ C′ D′ (printed in red) the same in the time of Hipparchus, ♈, ♎ being the earlier positions of the two equinoctial points, and ♈′, ♎′ the later positions.
Fig. 22.—The movement of the equator.
Fig. 33.—The precession of the equinoxes.
The annual motion ♈ ♈′ was, as has been stated, estimated by Hipparchus as being at least 36″ (equivalent to one degree in a century), and probably more. Its true value is considerably more, namely about 50″.
Fig. 24.—The precession of the equinoxes.
An important consequence of the motion of the equator thus discovered is that the sun in its annual journey round the ecliptic, after starting from the equinoctial point, returns to the new position of the equinoctial point a little before returning to its original position with respect to the stars, and the successive equinoxes occur slightly earlier than they otherwise would. From this fact is derived the name precession of the equinoxes, or more shortly, precession, which is applied to the motion that we have been considering. Hence it becomes necessary to recognise, as Hipparchus did, two different kinds of year, the tropical year or period required by the sun to return to the same position with respect to the equinoctial points, and the sidereal year or period of return to the same position with respect to the stars. If ♈ ♈′ denote the motion of the equinoctial point during a tropical year, then the sun after starting from the equinoctial point at ♈ arrives—at the end of a tropical year—at the new equinoctial point at ♈′; but the sidereal year is only complete when the sun has further described the arc ♈′ ♈ and returned to its original starting-point ♈. Hence, taking the modern estimate 50″ of the arc ♈ ♈′, the sun, in the sidereal year, describes an arc of 360°, in the tropical year an arc less by 50″, or 359° 59′ 10″; the lengths of the two years are therefore in this proportion, and the amount by which the sidereal year exceeds the tropical year bears to either the same ratio as 50″ to 360° (or 1,296,000″), and is therefore (365-1∕4 × 50)∕1296000 days of about 20 minutes.
Another way of expressing the amount of the precession is to say that the equinoctial point will describe the complete circuit of the ecliptic and return to the same position after about 26,000 years.
The length of each kind of year was also fixed by Hipparchus with considerable accuracy. That of the tropical year was obtained by comparing the times of solstices and equinoxes observed by earlier astronomers with those observed by himself. He found, for example, by comparison of the date of the summer solstice of 280 B.C., observed by Aristarchus of Samos, with that of the year 135 B.C., that the current estimate of 365-1∕4 days for the length of the year had to be diminished by 1∕300th of a day or about five minutes, an estimate confirmed roughly by other cases. It is interesting to note as an illustration of his scientific method that he discusses with some care the possible error of the observations, and concludes that the time of a solstice may be erroneous to the extent of about 3∕4 day, while that of an equinox may be expected to be within 1∕4 day of the truth. In the illustration given, this would indicate a possible error of 1-1∕2 days in a period of 145 years, or about 15 minutes in a year. Actually his estimate of the length of the year is about six minutes too great, and the error is thus much less than that which he indicated as possible. In the course of this work he considered also the possibility of a change in the length of the year, and arrived at the conclusion that, although his observations were not precise enough to show definitely the invariability of the year, there was no evidence to suppose that it had changed.
The length of the tropical year being thus evaluated at 365 days 5 hours 55 minutes, and the difference between the two kinds of year being given by the observations of precession, the sidereal year was ascertained to exceed 365-1∕4 days by about 10 minutes, a result agreeing almost exactly with modern estimates. That the addition of two erroneous quantities, the length of the tropical year and the amount of the precession, gave such an accurate result was not, as at first sight appears, a mere accident. The chief source of error in each case being the erroneous times of the several equinoxes and solstices employed, the errors in them would tend to produce errors of opposite kinds in the tropical year and in precession, so that they would in part compensate one another. This estimate of the length of the sidereal year was probably also to some extent verified by Hipparchus by comparing eclipse observations made at different epochs.
43. The great improvements which Hipparchus effected in the theories of the sun and moon naturally enabled him to deal more successfully than any of his predecessors with a problem which in all ages has been of the greatest interest, the prediction of eclipses of the sun and moon.
That eclipses of the moon were caused by the passage of the moon through the shadow of the earth thrown by the sun, or, in other words, by the interposition of the earth between the sun and moon, and eclipses of the sun by the passage of the moon between the sun and the observer, was perfectly well known to Greek astronomers in the time of Aristotle (§29), and probably much earlier (chapter I., §17), though the knowledge was probably confined to comparatively few people and superstitious terrors were long associated with eclipses.
The chief difficulty in dealing with eclipses depends on the fact that the moon’s path does not coincide with the ecliptic. If the moon’s path on the celestial sphere were identical with the ecliptic, then, once every month, at new moon, the moon (M) would pass exactly between the earth and the sun, and the latter would be eclipsed, and once every month also, at full moon, the moon (M′) would be in the opposite direction to the sun as seen from the earth, and would consequently be obscured by the shadow of the earth.
Fig. 25.—The earth’s shadow.
Fig. 26.—The ecliptic and the moon’s path.
As, however, the moon’s path is inclined to the ecliptic (§40), the latitudes of the sun and moon may differ by as much as 5°, either when they are in conjunction, i.e. when they have the same longitudes, or when they are in opposition, i.e. when their longitudes differ by 180°, and they will then in either case be too far apart for an eclipse to occur. Whether then at any full or new moon an eclipse will occur or not, will depend primarily on the latitude of the moon at the time, and hence upon her position with respect to the nodes of her orbit (§40). If conjunction takes place when the sun and moon happen to be near one of the nodes (N), as at S M in fig. 26, the sun and moon will be so close together that an eclipse will occur; but if it occurs at a considerable distance from a node, as at S′ M′, their centres are so far apart that no eclipse takes place.
Now the apparent diameter of either sun or moon is, as we have seen (§32), about 1∕2°; consequently when their discs just touch, as in fig. 27, the distance between their centres is also about 1∕2°. If then at conjunction the distance between their centres is less than this amount, an eclipse of the sun will take place; if not, there will be no eclipse. It is an easy calculation to determine (in fig. 26) the length of the side N S or N M of the triangle N M S, when S M has this value, and hence to determine the greatest distance from the node at which conjunction can take place if an eclipse is to occur. An eclipse of the moon can be treated in the same way, except that we there have to deal with the moon and the shadow of the earth at the distance of the moon. The apparent size of the shadow is, however, considerably greater than the apparent size of the moon, and an eclipse of the moon takes place if the distance between the centre of the moon and the centre of the shadow is less than about 1°. As before, it is easy to compute the distance of the moon or of the centre of the shadow from the node when opposition occurs, if an eclipse just takes place. As, however, the apparent sizes of both sun and moon, and consequently also that of the earth’s shadow, vary according to the distances of the sun and moon, a variation of which Hipparchus had no accurate knowledge, the calculation becomes really a good deal more complicated than at first sight appears, and was only dealt with imperfectly by him.
Fig. 27.—The sun and moon.
Fig. 28.—Partial eclipse
of the moon.
Fig. 29.—Total eclipse of
the moon.
Eclipses of the moon are divided into partial or total, the former occurring when the moon and the earth’s shadow only overlap partially (as in fig. 28), the latter when the moon’s disc is completely immersed in the shadow (fig. 29). In the same way an eclipse of the sun may be partial or total; but as the sun’s disc may be at times slightly larger than that of the moon, it sometimes happens also that the whole disc of the sun is hidden by the moon, except a narrow ring round the edge (as in fig. 30): such an eclipse is called annular. As the earth’s shadow at the distance of the moon is always larger than the moon’s disc, annular eclipses of the moon cannot occur.
Fig. 30.—Annular eclipse of the sun.
Thus eclipses take place if, and only if, the distance of the moon from a node at the time of conjunction or opposition lies within certain limits approximately known; and the problem of predicting eclipses could be roughly solved by such knowledge of the motion of the moon and of the nodes as Hipparchus possessed. Moreover, the length of the synodic and draconitic months (§40) being once ascertained, it became merely a matter of arithmetic to compute one or more periods after which eclipses would recur nearly in the same manner. For if any period of time contains an exact number of each kind of month, and if at any time an eclipse occurs, then after the lapse of the period, conjunction (or opposition) again takes place, and the moon is at the same distance as before from the node and the eclipse recurs very much as before. The saros, for example (chapter I., §17), contained very nearly 223 synodic or 242 draconitic months, differing from either by less than an hour. Hipparchus saw that this period was not completely reliable as a means of predicting eclipses, and showed how to allow for the irregularities in the moon’s and sun’s motion (§§39, 40) which were ignored by it, but was unable to deal fully with the difficulties arising from the variations in the apparent diameters of the sun or moon.
An important complication, however, arises in the case of eclipses of the sun, which had been noticed by earlier writers, but which Hipparchus was the first to deal with. Since an eclipse of the moon is an actual darkening of the moon, it is visible to anybody, wherever situated, who can see the moon at all; for example, to possible inhabitants of other planets, just as we on the earth can see precisely similar eclipses of Jupiter’s moons. An eclipse of the sun is, however, merely the screening off of the sun’s light from a particular observer, and the sun may therefore be eclipsed to one observer while to another elsewhere it is visible as usual. Hence in computing an eclipse of the sun it is necessary to take into account the position of the observer on the earth. The simplest way of doing this is to make allowance for the difference of direction of the moon as seen by an observer at the place in question, and by an observer in some standard position on the earth, preferably an ideal observer at the centre of the earth. If, in fig. 31, M denote the moon, C the centre of the earth, A a point on the earth between C and M (at which therefore the moon is overhead), and B any other point on the earth, then observers at C (or A) and B see the moon in slightly different directions, C M, B M, the difference between which is an angle known as the parallax, which is equal to the angle B M C and depends on the distance of the moon, the size of the earth, and the position of the observer at B. In the case of the sun, owing to its great distance, even as estimated by the Greeks, the parallax was in all cases too small to be taken into account, but in the case of the moon the parallax might be as much as 1° and could not be neglected.
Fig. 31.—Parallax.
If then the path of the moon, as seen from the centre of the earth, were known, then the path of the moon as seen from any particular station on the earth could be deduced by allowing for parallax, and the conditions of an eclipse of the sun visible there could be computed accordingly.
From the time of Hipparchus onwards lunar eclipses could easily be predicted to within an hour or two by any ordinary astronomer; solar eclipses probably with less accuracy; and in both cases the prediction of the extent of the eclipse, i.e. of what portion of the sun or moon would be obscured, probably left very much to be desired.
44. The great services rendered to astronomy by Hipparchus can hardly be better expressed than in the words of the great French historian of astronomy, Delambre, who is in general no lenient critic of the work of his predecessors:—
“When we consider all that Hipparchus invented or perfected, and reflect upon the number of his works and the mass of calculations which they imply, we must regard him as one of the most astonishing men of antiquity, and as the greatest of all in the sciences which are not purely speculative, and which require a combination of geometrical knowledge with a knowledge of phenomena, to be observed only by diligent attention and refined instruments.”26
45. For nearly three centuries after the death of Hipparchus, the history of astronomy is almost a blank. Several textbooks written during this period are extant, shewing the gradual popularisation of his great discoveries. Among the few things of interest in these books may be noticed a statement that the stars are not necessarily on the surface of a sphere, but may be at different distances from us, which, however, there are no means of estimating; a conjecture that the sun and stars are so far off that the earth would be a mere point seen from the sun and invisible from the stars; and a re-statement of an old opinion traditionally attributed to the Egyptians (whether of the Alexandrine period or earlier is uncertain), that Venus and Mercury revolve round the sun. It seems also that in this period some attempts were made to explain the planetary motions by means of epicycles, but whether these attempts marked any advance on what had been done by Apollonius and Hipparchus is uncertain.
It is interesting also to find in Pliny (A.D. 23-79) the well-known modern argument for the spherical form of the earth, that when a ship sails away the masts, etc., remain visible after the hull has disappeared from view.
A new measurement of the circumference of the earth by Posidonius (born about the end of Hipparchus’s life) may also be noticed; he adopted a method similar to that of Eratosthenes (§36), and arrived at two different results. The later estimate, to which he seems to have attached most weight, was 180,000 stadia, a result which was about as much below the truth as that of Eratosthenes was above it.
46. The last great name in Greek astronomy is that of Claudius Ptolemaeus, commonly known as Ptolemy, of whose life nothing is known except that he lived in Alexandria about the middle of the 2nd century A.D. His reputation rests chiefly on his great astronomical treatise, known as the Almagest,27 which is the source from which by far the greater part of our knowledge of Greek astronomy is derived, and which may be fairly regarded as the astronomical Bible of the Middle Ages. Several other minor astronomical and astrological treatises are attributed to him, some of which are probably not genuine, and he was also the author of an important work on geography, and possibly of a treatise on Optics, which is, however, not certainly authentic and maybe of Arabian origin. The Optics discusses, among other topics, the refraction or bending of light, by the atmosphere on the earth: it is pointed out that the light of a star or other heavenly body S, on entering our atmosphere (at A) and on penetrating to the lower and denser portions of it, must be gradually bent or refracted, the result being that the star appears to the observer at B nearer to the zenith Z than it actually is, i.e. the light appears to come from S′ instead of from S; it is shewn further that this effect must be greater for bodies near the horizon than for those near the zenith, the light from the former travelling through a greater extent of atmosphere; and these results are shewn to account for certain observed deviations in the daily paths of the stars, by which they appear unduly raised up when near the horizon. Refraction also explains the well-known flattened appearance of the sun or moon when rising or setting, the lower edge being raised by refraction more than the upper, so that a contraction of the vertical diameter results, the horizontal contraction being much less.28
Fig. 32.—Refraction by the atmosphere.
47. The Almagest is avowedly based largely on the work of earlier astronomers, and in particular on that of Hipparchus, for whom Ptolemy continually expresses the greatest admiration and respect. Many of its contents have therefore already been dealt with by anticipation, and need not be discussed again in detail. The book plays, however, such an important part in astronomical history, that it may be worth while to give a short outline of its contents, in addition to dealing more fully with the parts in which Ptolemy made important advances.
The Almagest consists altogether of 13 books. The first two deal with the simpler observed facts, such as the daily motion of the celestial sphere, and the general motions of the sun, moon, and planets, and also with a number of topics connected with the celestial sphere and its motion, such as the length of the day and the times of rising and setting of the stars in different zones of the earth; there are also given the solutions of some important mathematical problems,29 and a mathematical table30 of considerable accuracy and extent. But the most interesting parts of these introductory books deal with what may be called the postulates of Ptolemy’s astronomy (Book I., chap. ii.). The first of these is that the earth is spherical; Ptolemy discusses and rejects various alternative views, and gives several of the usual positive arguments for a spherical form, omitting, however, one of the strongest, the eclipse argument found in Aristotle (§29), possibly as being too recondite and difficult, and adding the argument based on the increase in the area of the earth visible when the observer ascends to a height. In his geography he accepts the estimate given by Posidonius that the circumference of the earth is 180,000 stadia. The other postulates which he enunciates and for which he argues are, that the heavens are spherical and revolve like a sphere; that the earth is in the centre of the heavens, and is merely a point in comparison with the distance of the fixed stars, and that it has no motion. The position of these postulates in the treatise and Ptolemy’s general method of procedure suggest that he was treating them, not so much as important results to be established by the best possible evidence, but rather as assumptions, more probable than any others with which the author was acquainted, on which to base mathematical calculations which should explain observed phenomena.31 His attitude is thus essentially different from that either of the early Greeks, such as Pythagoras, or of the controversialists of the 16th and early 17th centuries, such as Galilei (chapter VI.), for whom the truth or falsity of postulates analogous to those of Ptolemy was of the very essence of astronomy and was among the final objects of inquiry. The arguments which Ptolemy produces in support of his postulates, arguments which were probably the commonplaces of the astronomical writing of his time, appear to us, except in the case of the shape of the earth, loose and of no great value. The other postulates were, in fact, scarcely, capable of either proof or disproof with the evidence which Ptolemy had at command. His argument in favour of the immobility of the earth is interesting, as it shews his clear perception that the more obvious appearances can be explained equally well by a motion of the stars or by a motion of the earth; he concludes, however, that it is easier to attribute motion to bodies like the stars which seem to be of the nature of fire than to the solid earth, and points out also the difficulty of conceiving the earth to have a rapid motion of which we are entirely unconscious. He does not, however, discuss seriously the possibility that the earth or even Venus and Mercury may revolve round the sun.
The third book of the Almagest deals with the length of the year and theory of the sun, but adds nothing of importance to the work of Hipparchus.
48. The fourth book of the Almagest, which treats of the length of the month and of the theory of the moon, contains one of Ptolemy’s most important discoveries. We have seen that, apart from the motion of the moon’s orbit as a whole, and the revolution of the line of apses, the chief irregularity or inequality was the so-called equation of the centre (§§39, 40), represented fairly accurately by means of an eccentric, and depending only on the position of the moon with respect to its apogee. Ptolemy, however, discovered, what Hipparchus only suspected, that there was a further inequality in the moon’s motion—to which the name evection was afterwards given—and that this depended partly on its position with respect to the sun. Ptolemy compared the observed positions of the moon with those calculated by Hipparchus in various positions relative to the sun and apogee, and found that, although there was a satisfactory agreement at new and full moon, there was a considerable error when the moon was half-full, provided it was also not very near perigee or apogee. Hipparchus based his theory of the moon chiefly on observations of eclipses, i.e. on observations taken necessarily at full or new moon (§43), and Ptolemy’s discovery is due to the fact that he checked Hipparchus’s theory by observations taken at other times. To represent this new inequality, it was found necessary to use an epicycle and a deferent, the latter being itself a moving eccentric circle, the centre of which revolved round the earth. To account, to some extent, for certain remaining discrepancies between theory and observation, which occurred neither at new and full moon, nor at the quadratures (half-moon), Ptolemy introduced further a certain small to-and-fro oscillation of the epicycle, an oscillation to which he gave the name of prosneusis.32 Ptolemy thus succeeded in fitting his theory on to his observations so well that the error seldom exceeded 10′, a small quantity in the astronomy of the time, and on the basis of this construction he calculated tables from which the position of the moon at any required time could be easily deduced.
One of the inherent weaknesses of the system of epicycles occurred in this theory in an aggravated form. It has already been noticed in connection with the theory of the sun (§39), that the eccentric or epicycle produced an erroneous variation in the distance of the sun, which was, however, imperceptible in Greek times. Ptolemy’s system, however, represented the moon as being sometimes nearly twice as far off as at others, and consequently the apparent diameter ought at some times to have been not much more than half as great as at others—a conclusion obviously inconsistent with observation. It seems probable that Ptolemy noticed this difficulty, but was unable to deal with it; it is at any rate a significant fact that when he is dealing with eclipses, for which the apparent diameters of the sun and moon are of importance, he entirely rejects the estimates that might have been obtained from his lunar theory and appeals to direct observation (cf. also §51, note).
49. The fifth book of the Almagest contains an account of the construction and use of Ptolemy’s chief astronomical instrument, a combination of graduated circles known as the astrolabe.33
Then follows a detailed discussion of the moon’s parallax (§43), and of the distances of the sun and moon. Ptolemy obtains the distance of the moon by a parallax method which is substantially identical with that still in use. If we know the direction of the line C M (fig. 33) joining the centres of the earth and moon, or the direction of the moon as seen by an observer at A; and also the direction of the line B M, that is the direction of the moon as seen by an observer at B, then the angles of the triangle C B M are known, and the ratio of the sides C B, C M is known. Ptolemy obtained the two directions required by means of observations of the moon, and hence found that C M was 59 times C B, or that the distance of the moon was equal to 59 times the radius of the earth. He then uses Hipparchus’s eclipse method to deduce the distance of the sun from that of the moon thus ascertained, and finds the distance of the sun to be 1,210 times the radius of the earth. This number, which is substantially the same as that obtained by Hipparchus (§41), is, however, only about 1∕20 of the true number, as indicated by modern work (chapter XIII., §284).
