History
Further information: Former constellations and Star Names: Their Lore and MeaningThe current list of 88 constellations recognised by the International Astronomical Union since 1922 is based on the 48 listed by Ptolemy in his Almagest in the 2nd century. Ptolemy's catalogue is informed by Eudoxus of Cnidus, a Greek astronomer of the 4th century BC who introduced earlier Babylonian astronomy to the Hellenistic culture. Of the 48 constellations listed by Ptolemy, thirty can be shown to have a much longer history, reaching back into at least the Late Bronze Age. This concerns the zodiacal constellations in particular.
Read more about this topic: Constellation
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“There is a history in all men’s lives,
Figuring the natures of the times deceased,
The which observed, a man may prophesy,
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“History has neither the venerableness of antiquity, nor the freshness of the modern. It does as if it would go to the beginning of things, which natural history might with reason assume to do; but consider the Universal History, and then tell us,—when did burdock and plantain sprout first?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Let us not underrate the value of a fact; it will one day flower in a truth. It is astonishing how few facts of importance are added in a century to the natural history of any animal. The natural history of man himself is still being gradually written.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)