A Historical View of the Hindu Astronomy
From the Earliest Dawn of that Science in India to the Present Time

First published in 1825, this monograph charts the history of Indian astronomy from its Vedic origins to the modern era.

John Bentley (Author)

9781108055420, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 21 February 2013

334 pages, 9 b/w illus.
21.6 x 14 x 1.9 cm, 0.43 kg

Shrouded in poetry, the earliest accounts of Hindu astronomy can strike modern readers as obscure. They involve the marriage of the moon to twenty-seven princesses, a war between gods and giants, and shadows that give birth to planets. In this fascinating study, first published in Calcutta in 1823 and reissued here in the 1825 edition, John Bentley (c.1750–1824) strives to strip back the mythical aspects of the stories to reveal their foundations. He points out that early Hindu astronomers divided the night sky into twenty-seven sections; that a solar eclipse could have been described as an epic war between light and dark; and that Saturn is often observed in the Earth's shadow. Using data from modern astronomical tables, he dates events, texts and people, whether mythical or factual, as well as charting the history of Indian astronomy from its earliest records to its modern developments.

Preface
Part I: 1. The early part of the Hindu astronomy involved in great obscurity
2. Rama
3. The war between the gods and the giants in the west
4. Commencement of the third astronomical period
5. Commencement of the fifth astronomical period
Part II: 1. Commencement of the eighth astronomical period
2. System of Varaha
3. The Arya Siddhanta
4. Vahara Mihira, like Aryabhatta, endeavours to support the new order of things
5. The cause of Varaha Mihira being thrown back into antiquity by the moderns explained
6. Self-defence the object of this section
Appendix.

Subject Areas: History of science [PDX]