The geometry of moving stellar configurations and the dating of theAlmagest

Калашников, В. В.; Nosovskii, G. V.; Фоменко, А. Т.

doi:10.1007/bf01099024

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“…It is interesting to note that two stars (Canopus and Previndemiatrix) which were removed from the catalogue, turned to be a spikes, see [20] for details.…”

Section: Preliminary Remarksmentioning

confidence: 99%

When was ptolemy's star catalogue in ?Almagest? compiled in reality? Statistical analysis

1989

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This work is devoted to describing new statistical and geometrical procedures for dating ancient star catalogues considering numerical data contained in these catalogues and the known real configurations of stars on the celestial sphere. The method was tested on several star catalogues whose dates are well known (Tycho Brahe, etc.) and on several artificially generated star catalogues. Then the same method was applied to the Almagest. The results obtained do not confirm the traditional dating of the Almagest (2nd century AD or 2nd century BC) but shift its dating to the Arabian epoch: 600-1300 AD. O. Preliminary Remarks on the Mathematical Aspects of the ProblemThis paper involves at least three aspects: historical (Section 1), astronomical (Sections 2 and 3) and mathematical (Sections 4-8).Its main problem is: 'Is it possible to date an ancient star catalogue by mathematical tools?' Our answer is: 'Yes'.The initial data are star coordinates contained in the star catalogue. In order to determine the date of its compilation, we need to know the correct star coordinates for any point of time in the past. For this purpose, we use the well-known equations describing the trajectories of stars starting from their present positions. Every star from the catalogue has two coordinates -longitude and latitude. We consider in our work only latitudes. The reason for this is that it is possible to obtain all the necessary information for dating using latitudes only. Longitudes are not reliable for this purpose (see details in Section 1). They lead to additional errors, and eliminating them provides additional accuracy.

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“…It is interesting to note that two stars (Canopus and Previndemiatrix) which were removed from the catalogue, turned to be a spikes, see [20] for details.…”

Section: Preliminary Remarksmentioning

confidence: 99%