The movement of the moon in space had been well documented by the second half of the nineteenth century. In this monograph, which first appeared in 1874, James Nasmyth (1808 90) and James Carpenter (1840 99) pay closer attention to the lunar surface, notably illustrating their work with photographs of accurate plaster models. At this time, many questions about the moon's properties were still open. Could the moon support life? Did it have an atmosphere? How had its craters been formed? Marshalling the latest available evidence, Nasmyth and Carpenter provide their answers in a text accompanied...
The movement of the moon in space had been well documented by the second half of the nineteenth century. In this monograph, which first appeared in 18...
When this highly illustrated work first appeared in 1900, the day-to-day business of an astronomer was prone to misapprehension; the reality tended to be clouded by the temptation to imagine observatories as preoccupied with making awe-inspiring discoveries and glimpsing distant worlds. Describing himself as a hybrid between an engineer and an accountant, astronomer Edward Walter Maunder (1851 1928) explodes the romantic myths and takes the reader on an entertaining tour of the history and real purposes of the Royal Observatory at Greenwich. Founded with the sole aim of advancing navigation...
When this highly illustrated work first appeared in 1900, the day-to-day business of an astronomer was prone to misapprehension; the reality tended to...
By the time of his death, William Herschel (1738 1822) had built revolutionary telescopes, identified hundreds of binary stars, and published astronomical papers in over forty volumes of the Royal Society's Philosophical Transactions. This two-volume collection, which originally appeared in 1912, was the first to gather together his scattered publications. It draws also on a wealth of previously unpublished material, from personal letters to numerous papers presented to the Philosophical Society of Bath. Although Herschel is best known for his discovery of Uranus, this collection highlights...
By the time of his death, William Herschel (1738 1822) had built revolutionary telescopes, identified hundreds of binary stars, and published astronom...
By the time of his death, William Herschel (1738 1822) had built revolutionary telescopes, identified hundreds of binary stars, and published astronomical papers in over forty volumes of the Royal Society's Philosophical Transactions. This two-volume collection, which originally appeared in 1912, was the first to gather together his scattered publications. It draws also on a wealth of previously unpublished material, from personal letters to numerous papers presented to the Philosophical Society of Bath. Although Herschel is best known for his discovery of Uranus, this collection highlights...
By the time of his death, William Herschel (1738 1822) had built revolutionary telescopes, identified hundreds of binary stars, and published astronom...
Spherical or positional astronomy is used primarily to map objects on the celestial sphere. In this technical work, first published in 1908 and intended for advanced students, Sir Robert Stawell Ball (1840 1913) breaks down the field into distinct areas of study. Assuming a good level of geometry and trigonometry, he begins with fundamental formulae before moving into the determination of coordinates, atmospheric refraction, the theory of cartography, and more. Each section contains exercises derived from a variety of sources, including contemporary Cambridge examinations. The coverage ranges...
Spherical or positional astronomy is used primarily to map objects on the celestial sphere. In this technical work, first published in 1908 and intend...
Although astronomical guides were available in the early nineteenth century, they tended to come from continental presses and were rarely in English. This two-volume work by the clergyman and astronomer William Pearson (1767 1847) aimed, with brilliant success, to compile data from extant sources into one of the first English practical guides to astronomy. Most of the tables were updated and improved versions, and some were wholly reconstructed to streamline the calculation processes. Sir John Herschel dubbed it 'one of the most important and extensive works on that subject which has ever...
Although astronomical guides were available in the early nineteenth century, they tended to come from continental presses and were rarely in English. ...
Throughout her lifetime, Margaret Bryan (fl. 1795 1816) ran several schools for girls. Although science and maths were not usually considered suitable subjects for young women, Bryan was convinced that the use of one's reasoning faculties was all but a religious obligation. She taught across a huge range of topics, including optics, trigonometry and the history of astronomy. This book is a collection of ten of her lectures and was first published in 1797. Largely non-technical and written for those without a thorough knowledge of mathematics, the lectures explain contemporary science as...
Throughout her lifetime, Margaret Bryan (fl. 1795 1816) ran several schools for girls. Although science and maths were not usually considered suitable...
Knowing there was no money in science, Vincenzo Galilei wanted his son to become a cloth-dealer. While the young Galileo was disobeying his father and cultivating an unwholesome interest in geometry, Tycho Brahe was maintaining the impoverished Johannes Kepler and his entire family. Not long after this, a certain Cambridge mathematician noticed a strange phenomenon that became known as 'the precession of the equinoxes', before formulating his law of gravity. In this fascinating collection of lectures, first published in 1893, the eminent Professor of Physics Oliver Lodge (1851 1940) takes the...
Knowing there was no money in science, Vincenzo Galilei wanted his son to become a cloth-dealer. While the young Galileo was disobeying his father and...
A talented mathematician trained at Trinity College, Dublin, Sir Robert Stawell Ball (1840 1913) was best known in the early twentieth century for his immensely popular books on astronomy. He also gave the Royal Institution's Christmas Lectures on five occasions. First published in 1905, this concise guide to the basics of astronomy assumes almost no prior knowledge of the subject. Beginning with simple phenomena such as the seasons and the effects of atmospheric refraction, Ball expands quickly into month-by-month indexes of the night sky, star charts, and explanations of some of the...
A talented mathematician trained at Trinity College, Dublin, Sir Robert Stawell Ball (1840 1913) was best known in the early twentieth century for his...
When this book first appeared in 1793, there had been no significant work on comets published in English since Edmond Halley's death some fifty years before. In Europe the field was dominated by French astronomers such as Pingre and Laplace, but their ornate styles were often difficult to translate. In this concise monograph, Sir Henry Englefield (c.1752 1822) draws both on this continental work and on his own correspondence with William Herschel to produce one of the few accessible manuals in English for the computation of cometary orbits. He includes mathematical examples as new formulae...
When this book first appeared in 1793, there had been no significant work on comets published in English since Edmond Halley's death some fifty years ...
