Speaker
Description
The History on the Moon
Over the time, the lunar nomenclature presented by Giambattista Riccioli (1598-1671) in his Almagestum novum, in the mid-seventeenth century, outperformed contemporary proposals, such as that developed by Michael Florent van Langren (1600-1675) or the even more famous Selenographia by Johannes Hevelius (1611-1687). His idea of associating the various lunar spots with the names of famous astronomers of ancient and contemporary times was successful, so much so that it was chosen by the International Astronomical Union as the starting point for the modern nomenclature of the Moon, in 1932.
But what savants does Riccioli places on the Moon, and what can they tell us about the historical and astronomical culture of the 17th century? This is the subject of this work.
References
RICCIOLI G. B., Almagestum novum astronomiam veterem novamque, Bononiae, ex typographia haeredis Victorij Benatij, 1651.
MACDONALD T. L., Riccioli and lunar nomenclature, in “Journal of the British Astronomical Association’, Vol. 77 (1967), pp.112-117
MARAZZINI C., I nomi della Luna. Tecnicismi astronomici e selenografia da Galileo a Riccioli, in “Studi Linguistici Italiani” XXXI (X della III serie), fascicolo II, 2005, pp. 161-93.
