Earliest certain record of Halley's comet
Primer registro seguro del cometa Halley
- Date
- 240 BCE · confidence high
- Place
- Xianyang, Shaanxi, China
- Credited to
- Court astronomers of Qin (Shiji of Sima Qian)
- Field
- Cosmos & Earth
What was discovered
The Shiji records a 'broom star' seen in 240 BCE that corresponds to a passage of Halley's Comet. The Chinese series of comet records is the longest and has served to reconstruct its ancient orbit.
A mention from 613 BCE in the Chunqiu could also be Halley's Comet, but it is not certain. The prediction of its periodicity is due to Halley (1705).
What it led to
- retrospective calculation of the orbits of periodic comets
- continuous catalogue of comets