MGMT 1050 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Eclipse Records, Wangliang, Ed Krupp
20 Jul 2016
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Document Summary
Three flames ate the sun, and big stars were seen. " R 16 h t a traditional chinese /ion - his paw on a globe of the world - guards a gateway within the forbidden city in beijing. The emperors of china set up a bureau of astronomers to report every odd happening in the sky. 0 p p 0 s i t e chinese astronomer zu chongzhi, drawing with a pair of compasses. In the fifth century ad, zu proposed a new calendar, accurate to better than a minute in the year. He was building on a tradition of chinese astronomy dating back a/most two millennia before his time. So runs the oldest written account in the history of astronomy. And, amazingly, we can date it precisely - to june 5, 1302 bc. To anyone who"s witnessed the incredible sight of a total eclipse of the sun, the description strikes a chord even today.
