. Bulletin of the Southern California Academy of Sciences. Science; Natural history; Natural history. a metallic solar atmosphere extending some ten millions of miles in space. It is the most sublime spectacle ever presented to the eyes of man. Eclipses, Past and Future The shepherd-astronomers in Mesopotamia of old. while watching their flocks at night under cloudless skies, had become acquainted with some valuable astronomical facts. They had observed that the sun, moon and "the wandering stars" (the planets) follow the same path in the heavens, a belt fourteen degrees wide, which
. Bulletin of the Southern California Academy of Sciences. Science; Natural history; Natural history. a metallic solar atmosphere extending some ten millions of miles in space. It is the most sublime spectacle ever presented to the eyes of man. Eclipses, Past and Future The shepherd-astronomers in Mesopotamia of old. while watching their flocks at night under cloudless skies, had become acquainted with some valuable astronomical facts. They had observed that the sun, moon and "the wandering stars" (the planets) follow the same path in the heavens, a belt fourteen degrees wide, which they called the Zo- diac. They had discovered that when the movements of the sun and moon were along the center of that belt, eclipses occurred ; hence the name ecliptic. But, most wonderful of all, they knew- from experience that eclipses repeat themselves every 18 years, 11 days and 8 hours. 'Thales, the Greek philosopher, who had been taught by the Egyptian priests and Chaldean sooth- sayers, was thus able to foretell the total eclipse of the sun. May 28, 585 B. C. Herodotus relates that this classic eclipse occurred during a battle between the Lydians and Medes, and that the combatants became so stupefied _ that the battle stopped at once and put an end to the war. Cicero and Pliny make like statements. Explanation of a Total Eclipse oe the Sun The Sim and moon are apparently the same size in the sky, and as their motions are along the same plane, the moon some- times intervenes and cuts off the view of the sun. The moon being a solid body casts a shadow, which is cone-shaped and sometimes long enough to reach the earth. As the earth is turning on its axis this shadow, about fifty miles broad, drags over the surface of the earth. People situated at the time within the path of the shadow in looking up behold the sun _ Battle between the Medes and Lydians, arrested by an eclipse of tbe sun. May 28, 585 B. Please note that these images are extracted from scanned
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