#cellarius

1661~Cellarius's chart illustrating a heliocentric model of the universe,as proposed by Nicolaus Copernicus

Christian constellations II, from Harmonia Macrocosmica (1660) by Andreas Cellarius

Ptolemaic View of the Universe, Andreas Cellarius, 1708.⠀ ⠀ One of 29 celestial charts from Andreas Cellarius' stunning Harmonia Macrocosmica (1660). More over on the site (click link in bio and search "Harmonia"), and also prints available in our online shop.⠀ .⠀ .⠀ .⠀ .⠀ .⠀ #universe #celestial #map #earth #chart #astrology #astronomy #horizon #cellarius #solarsystem #space #art https://www.instagram.com/p/B-Uz0djpqY6/?igshid=xa7sctzijdtf

Cellarius. Harmonia Macrocosmica. 1660. Cover art for Taschen edition.

Asense - Cellarius (2014) Progressive Death Metal, Chile

The Southern hemisphere, from Harmonia Macrocosmica (1660) by Andreas Cellarius

The central figure is that of Urania, the muse of astronomy. She sits surrounded by the great astronomers of the past: on her right, we can recognise Tycho Brahe, while on her left sits no one other than Nicolaus Copernicus. Behind them stands a row of important figures from past centuries (from left to right): Claudius Ptolemy holding a copy of his Geographia, the Islamic astronomer al-Battani (probably, but it’s hard to say with certainty; it might also be Julius Schiller), king Alfonso X the Wise, and Johan Philip Lansberge.

The eccentric circle is an essential ingredient of the Ptolemy’s description of planetary motion. It explains the Sun’s orbit without the need to refer to the epicycles. The idea dates back to Hipparchus, who was motivated by the observation of uneven durations of the four seasons. In this model, the Sun moves along a circle (deferent) the center of which (marked with A on the plate, „centrum eccentrici“) is located away from the Earth (marked with B, „Terra centrum Universi“). The line that runs through the Earth, labeled „Aequinoctialis seu colurus aequinoctrium“, marks the division of the deferent into autumn-to-spring season below it, and spring-to-autumn season above, which is visibly longer than the former. The two figures in the lower corners (zoomed) illustrate the equivalence between this model and the application of epicycles to the Sun’s motion (the circle trailed by the subsequent positions of the Sun on the epicycle is the eccentric circle). The orbits of the planets are more tricky and cannot be described without the epicycles (or elliptic orbits, for that matter).