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Artwork for The Song of Urania

The Song of Urania

Joe Antognini

A history of astronomy, from antiquity to the present.

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47 episodes
Updated Nov 2, 2024

Episodes47

Jul 24, 2021 · 53 min
Episode 7: Greek Tales of Ancient Nights & Days
As we start to examine the astronomy of Ancient Greece we hear of the myth cycles of Theseus and Perseus, episodes from both of which appear in the night sky. These myth cycles help us to understand the conception the ancient Greeks had to the...
Jun 25, 2021 · 39 min
Episode 6: System of a B
We dive into the most sophisticated model of planetary and lunar motions that the Babylonians developed: System A and System B and see how the Babylonians used this method to predict eclipses, the length of months, and even measure the precession of...
May 27, 2021 · 42 min
Episode 5: A System of Weights & Measures
We look at how the Babylonians represented information in their astronomical tablets by examining their number system and the unit system. Then we dive into the Babylonian discovery of the Saros cycle, which was a deep regularity in the pattern of...
Apr 27, 2021 · 51 min
Episode 4: The Astronomical Diaries
We step back and look at Babylon's broader political history and see how Babylonian astronomy changes during the rise of the Neo-Babylonian Empire and the Persian Conquest. Then we look at some of the types of astronomical records the Babylonians...
Mar 28, 2021 · 42 min
Episode 3: When the Moon Disappears
We look at how the Babylonians associated the heavens with their gods and how Mesopotamian astrology developed after the Assyrian conquest. We hear some examples of astrological omens and see how Babylonians handled the most malevolent of omens, the...
Feb 28, 2021 · 45 min
Episode 2: The Stars over Babylon
What are the earliest records of constellations? How did the ancient Babylonians keep track of their progress through the year? And how do we know what we know about Babylonia?
Jan 29, 2021 · 30 min
Episode 1: The Heavens & History
How should we approach the history of astronomy?  How have the questions that astronomers have asked changed through the ages?  We look at some of these questions and sketch out the broad arc of this field from antiquity to the present day.