First Description of Discrete Stars Composing the Milk Way in Thomas Watson's Hekatompathia (1582)
classification
⚛️ physics.hist-ph
keywords
descriptiondiscretefirsthekatompathiamilkstarsthomaswatson
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We note that the first unambiguous description of the Milk Way as being composed of a large number of discrete stars is in Sonnet 31 of Thomas Watson's (d 1592) Hekatompathia (1582), nearly 30 years before Galileo's description. We discuss implications of this early description.
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