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| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
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| Almagest | 4/4 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almagest | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T08:32:30.906530+00:00 | kb-cron |
== Modern assessment == Under the scrutiny of modern scholarship, and the cross-checking of observations contained in the Almagest against figures produced through backwards extrapolation, various patterns of errors have emerged within the work. A prominent example is Ptolemy's use of measurements said to have been taken at noon, but which systematically produce readings that are off by half an hour, as if the observations were taken at 12:30pm. However, an explanation for this error was found in 1969. The overall quality of Claudius Ptolemy's scholarship and place as "one of the most outstanding scientists of antiquity" has been challenged by several modern writers, most prominently by Robert R. Newton in the 1977 book The Crime of Claudius Ptolemy, which asserted that the scholar fabricated his observations to fit his theories. Newton accused Ptolemy of systematically inventing data or doctoring the data of earlier astronomers, and labelled him "the most successful fraud in the history of science". One striking error noted by Newton was an autumn equinox said to have been observed by Ptolemy and "measured with the greatest care" at 2pm on 25 September 132, when the equinox should have been observed at 9:54am the day prior. Herbert Lewis, who had reworked some of Ptolemy's calculations, agreed with Newton that "Ptolemy was an outrageous fraud", and that "all those results capable of statistical analysis point beyond question towards fraud and against accidental error". Although some have described the charges laid by Newton as "erudite and imposing", others have disagreed with the findings. Bernard R. Goldstein wrote, "Unfortunately, Newton’s arguments in support of these charges are marred by all manner of distortions, misunderstandings, and excesses of rhetoric due to an intensely polemical style." Owen Gingerich, while agreeing that the Almagest contains "some remarkably fishy numbers", including in the matter of the 30-hour displaced equinox, which he noted aligned perfectly with predictions made by Hipparchus 278 years earlier, rejected the qualification of fraud. John Phillips Britton, Visiting Fellow at Yale University, wrote of R.R. Newton, "I think that his main conclusion with respect to Ptolemy’s stature and achievements as an astronomer is simply wrong, and that the Almagest should be seen as a great, if not indeed the first, scientific treatise." He continued, "Newton’s work does focus critical attention on the many difficulties and inconsistencies apparent in the fine structure of the Almagest. In particular, his conclusion that the Almagest is not a historical account of how Ptolemy actually derived his models and parameters is essentially the same as mine, although our reasons for this conclusion and our inferences from it differ radically."
== Modern editions == The Almagest under the Latin title Syntaxis mathematica, was edited by J. L. Heiberg in Claudii Ptolemaei opera quae exstant omnia, vols. 1.1 and 1.2 (1898, 1903).
Three translations of the Almagest into English have been published. The first, by R. Catesby Taliaferro of St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, was included in volume 16 of the Great Books of the Western World in 1952. The second, by G. J. Toomer, Ptolemy's Almagest in 1984, with a second edition in 1998. The third was a partial translation by Bruce M. Perry in The Almagest: Introduction to the Mathematics of the Heavens in 2014. A direct French translation from the Greek text was published in two volumes in 1813 and 1816 by Nicholas Halma, including detailed historical comments in a 69-page preface. It has been described as "suffer[ing] from excessive literalness, particularly where the text is difficult" by Toomer, and as "very faulty" by Serge Jodra. The scanned books are available in full at the Gallica French National library. A new French translation, with some interactive diagrams, was prepared in 2022 and is freely available on the web.
== Gallery ==
== See also == Abū al-Wafā' Būzjānī (who also wrote an Almagest) Book of Fixed Stars Star cartography Euclid's Elements
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== Further reading == Evans, James (1998). The History and Practice of Ancient Astronomy. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-509539-5. Neugebauer, Otto (1948). "Mathematical Methods in Ancient Astronomy". Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society. 54 (11): 1013–1041. doi:10.1090/S0002-9904-1948-09089-9. Neugebauer, Otto (1975). A History of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy. Berlin: Springer. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3. ISBN 3-540-06995-X. Hanson, Norwood Russell (1960). "The Mathematical Power of Epicyclical Astronomy". Isis. 51 (2): 150–158. doi:10.1086/348869. JSTOR 226846. Ridpath, Ian (2018) [1998]. Star Tales (Rev. ed.). Cambridge: Lutterworth Press. ISBN 978-0-7188-9478-8. Pedersen, Olaf (1993) [1974]. Early Physics and Astronomy: A Historical Introduction (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-40899-8. Pedersen, Olaf (2011) [1974]. A Survey of the Almagest (2nd ed.). Berlin: Springer. ISBN 978-1-4939-3922-0. Ptolemaeus, Claudius. Syntaxis mathematica (in Greek). OCLC 767751182. Retrieved 10 April 2023 – via MDZ/München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek. Shank, Michael H. (2009). "Islamic Science and the Making of European Renaissance by George Saliba". Aestimatio (Book review). 6: 63–72.
== External links ==
Syntaxis Mathematica (Almagest), original Greek, edited by Johan Ludvig Heiberg, 1898. Syntaxis mathematica in J.L. Heiberg's edition (1898–1903) Ptolemy's De Analemmate. PDF scans of Heiberg's Greek edition, now in the public domain (Koine Greek) Toomer's English translation Duckworth, 1984. Ptolemy. Almagest. Latin translation from the Arabic by Gerard of Cremona. Digitized version of manuscript made in Northern Italy c. 1200–1225 held by the State Library of Victoria. University of Vienna: Almagestum (1515) PDFs of different resolutions. Edition of Petrus Liechtenstein, Latin translation of Gerard of Cremona. Almagest Ephemeris Calculator by Robert Van Gent. Positions for any date, translation of dates in calendars used by Ptolemy. Extensive list of references and articles. Online luni-solar and planetary ephemeris calculator based on the Almagest A podcast discussion by Prof. M Heath and Dr A. Chapman of a recent re-discovery of a 14th-century manuscript in the university of Leeds Library Star catalog in ASCII (in Latin) Animation of Ptolemy's model of the universe by Andre Rehak (YouTube) (in French) French translation, with some diagrams animated, interactive, or random (in Hebrew) Maimonides explaining why you need to learn Almagest first to understand science