Media Contributed by Rick
Venus Phases from New Almagest The crescent phases of Venus and detailed representations of its appearance as seen through a telescope, from Riccioli's 1651 New Almagest.
Frontispiece of Riccioli's 1651 New Almagest Mythological figures observe the heavens with a telescope and weigh the heliocentric theory of Copernicus in a balance against his modified version of Tycho Brahe's geo-heliocentric system, in which the Sun, Moon, Jupiter and Saturn orbit the Earth while Mercury, Venus, and Mars orbit the Sun. The old Ptolemaic geocentric theory lies discarded on the ground, made obsolete by the telescope's discoveries. These are illustrated at top and include phases of Venus and Mercury and a surface feature on Mars (left), moons of Jupiter, rings of Saturn, and features on the moon (right). The balance tips in favor of Riccioli's "Tychonic" system.
Giovanni Battista Riccioli cropped and retouched
USS Al-Batani An illustrious Federation Excelsiorclass explorer in Star Trek: Voyager
Albategnius Lunar Crater Oblique view from Apollo 16 (craft's gamma-ray spectrometer visible in upper left), facing south. The crater is named after Arab astronomer al-Battani - name originally assigned by Italian astronomer Giovanni Riccioli in 1651.
al-Battānī (858 - 929) Artist's impression of al-Battānī holding an astrolabe
Al-Battani cropped
Edward II of England cropped
Edward I and wife Eleanor. Early fourteenth-century manuscript: Artist has perhaps tried to depict Edward's blepharoptosis, a trait he inherited from his father.
