Sun, Moons, Telescope
Pre telescope drawings of the moon are rare, and the few that exist
didn't find their way into print until after the invention of the
telescope. One wonders if this was because markings on the moon were
a poor fit for Aristotelian cosmology. They couldn't be denied but
they could be, and apparently were, ignored.
This late sixteenth century drawing is by William Gilbert, best known for his work on magnetism.
The Moon from
The Galileo Project Rice University
From the first use of the telescope early in the seventeenth
century until the development of astrophotography
near the end of the nineteenth, drawings were the only effective
method of disseminating observational results.
Thomas Harriot's Moon Drawings from The Galileo Project Rice University
Also see
The Face of the Moon from the
Linda Hall Library.
|
The sketch below, of the moons of Jupiter, is from a 1610 manuscript by Galileo.
DAHAP Solar Digital Archives of the History of Astronomy.
Satellites of Jupiter from
The Galileo Project Rice University