Brown University

astronomy

History of Science Collection

|
a book page: young osage warrior

The John Hay houses a large History of Science Collection which includes extensive holdings of old and rare editions of early scientific texts as well as now outdated and pseudoscientific texts. Geographically and temporally broad, the collection includes the Pingree Collection, which focuses on ancient Indic sciences and includes a number of works in Sanskrit … History of Science Collection

Material of the Week: Sphaera Mundi

|
A detailed 16th-century woodcut diagram from Sphaera Mundi showing a geocentric model of the celestial sphere.

Published: 1546, Basel, Switzerland Published just three years after Copernicus proposed his heliocentric (Sun-centered) cosmic model, Sphaera Mundi, written by Rabbi Abraham Hispanus, subscribes to the still widely accepted geocentric (Earth-centered) model of the universe. In Hebrew and Latin, the text elucidates the design of the universe with dozens of illustrations, and various leaves include … Material of the Week: Sphaera Mundi