ancient astronomers

By mooretabia
  • 168 BCE

    Claudius Ptolemy

    Ptolemy set up a solar system model in which the sun, stars, and other planets revolved around the Earth.
  • 276

    Eratosthenes

    Eratosthenes used the sun to measure the size of the round Earth. Eratosthenes measurement of 24,660 miles was only 211 miles off the true measurement.
  • 1473

    Nicolaus Copernicus

    Copernicus was a Polish astronomer who put forth the theory that the Sun is at rest near the center of the Universe, and that the Earth, spinning on its axis once daily, revolves annually around the Sun. This is called the heliocentric, or Sun-centered, system.
  • 1546

    Tychp Brahe

    Brahe built instruments to set accurate sights on the stars, and he invented the telescope by aiming to confirm his own picture of the universe.
  • 1571

    Johannes Kepler

    Kelper famous discovery was that the planets move around the Sun in orbits shapes liked ellipses.

  • Sir Isaac Newton

    Newton was famous for the law of forces, specifically gravity.

  • Albert Einstein

    A solar eclipse has allowed scientists to observe phenomena predicted by Einstein's general relativity theory, and news of the theory's confirmation is announced at a ceremonial meeting of the Royal Society of London. Einstein becomes famous.