Astronomy

Careers in astronomy for women (as in other sciences) were a rarity in Britain and Ireland until well into the twentieth century. The book investigates the place of women in astronomy before that era, recounted in the form of biographies of about 25 women born between 1650 and 1900 who in varying capacities contributed to its progress during the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Who has not gazed with wonder at the night sky, especially from a dark site far away from city lights? The great canopy of stars stretching overhead suggests that our world is part of a vastly larger cosmos. But how large is it? Where do we fit in? And how did it all begin? These questions have puzzled stargazers for thousands of years, and the search for answers helped spark the great advances of the scientific revolution in the 16th and 17th centuries. But only in our own time has the full picture of the true immensity, variety, and surpassing strangeness of the Universe come into focus.

This book discusses the study of astronomy in different cultures, applied historical astronomy and history of multi-wavelength astronomy, and the genesis of recent research. It contains peer-reviewed papers gathered from the International Conference on Oriental Astronomy 9 (ICOA-9) held at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Pune, India. It covers the areas like megalithic and other prehistoric astronomy, astronomical records in ancient texts, astronomical myths and architecture, astronomical themes in numismatics and rock art, ancient astronomers and their instruments, star maps and star catalogues, historical records and observations of astronomical events, calendars, calendrical science and chronology, the relation between astronomy and mathematics, and maritime astronomy. This book will be a valuable complement to a future generation of students and researchers who develop an interest in the field of Asian and circum-Pacific history of astronomy.