Brief History of Astronomy

By NO034
  • 150

    Ptolemy completes the Almagest

  • 1054

    Supernova forming the crab nebula occurs

  • Feb 19, 1473

    Nicolaus Copernicus is born

  • May 24, 1543

    Nicolaus Copernicus dies

  • Dec 14, 1546

    Tycho Brahe is born

  • Feb 15, 1564

    Galileo Galilei is born

  • Dec 27, 1571

    Johannes Kepler is born

  • Period: to

    Heliocentric theory slowly accepted

  • Tycho Brahe dies

  • Kepler's first two laws are published

  • Kepler publishes his third law

  • Johannes Kepler dies

  • Galileo Galilei dies

  • Isaac Newton is born

  • Newton publishes his three laws and law of universal gravitation

  • Isaac Newton dies

  • Messier publishes the preliminary version of his catalog

    This version contained 45 objects that Messier and other astronomers observed.

  • Messier publishes the final version of his catalog

    The final version contained 103 objects. Note that later astronomers unofficially added several objects to Messier's catalog long after his death, increasing the total list to 110 objects.

  • Neptune is first observed

  • Albert Einstein is born

  • Dr. Max Planck finds a constant to explain the blackbody radiation curve

  • Einstein's publishes his special theory of relativity

  • Ejnar Hertzsprung and Henry Russell develop the HR diagram

  • Einstein's theory of general relativity is published

  • Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar formulates the Chandrasekhar limit

  • Albert Einstein dies

  • NASA is founded

  • Robert Wilson and Arno Penzias discover cosmic background radiation

  • Cygnus x-1 is discovered as the first black hole

  • Hubble Space Telescope is launched

  • James Webb Space Telescope is launched