Identification of the five naked-eye planets
Identificación de los cinco planetas visibles
- Date
- c. 2000 BCE · confidence medium
- Place
- Babylon, Mesopotamia, Iraq
- Credited to
- Sumerian and Babylonian astronomer-priests
- Field
- Cosmos & Earth
What was discovered
Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn were recognised as 'wandering stars' distinct from the fixed ones; the Venus tablets of Ammisaduqa (17th century BCE) record their appearances. It is the origin of the concept of a planet.
The recognition that the morning and evening Venus are the same body is attributed in Greece to Pythagoras, but the Babylonians already knew it.
What it led to
- Planetary astrology
- Seven-day week
- Geometric models of planetary motion
Built on
Made possible
- Saros cycle and eclipse predictionc. 750 BCE
- Planetary ephemerides
- Seven-day week