The Song of Urania

As we start to examine the astronomy of Ancient Greece we hear of the myth cycles of Theseus and Perseus, episodes from both of which appear in the night sky. These myth cycles help us to understand …

We dive into the most sophisticated model of planetary and lunar motions that the Babylonians developed: System A and System B and see how the Babylonians used this method to predict eclipses, the le…

We look at how the Babylonians represented information in their astronomical tablets by examining their number system and the unit system. Then we dive into the Babylonian discovery of the Saros cycl…

We step back and look at Babylon's broader political history and see how Babylonian astronomy changes during the rise of the Neo-Babylonian Empire and the Persian Conquest. Then we look at some of th…

We look at how the Babylonians associated the heavens with their gods and how Mesopotamian astrology developed after the Assyrian conquest. We hear some examples of astrological omens and see how Bab…

What are the earliest records of constellations? How did the ancient Babylonians keep track of their progress through the year? And how do we know what we know about Babylonia?

How should we approach the history of astronomy?  How have the questions that astronomers have asked changed through the ages?  We look at some of these questions and sketch out the broad arc of this…