Abstract
To the very small number of non-Chinese observations of solar spots prior to the invention of the telescope we may add one, which I find in the voyages of Henry Hudson, published by the Hackluyt Society. He appears to have noticed such a phenomenon on March 21, 1609. Hudson says, “Then we observed the sunne, having a slake, and found our heigth to bee 70 deg. 30 min.” A note says, the word slake, as a substantive, seems to be a north country word, meaning according to Brocket “an accumulation of mud or slime from slijck, cœnum, lutum.” It will be remembered that there is a paper by Mr. Williams, the late Secretary of the R.A.S., on Chinese observations of solar spots in the monthly notices for April 1873. Mr. Williams's translation records forty-five such between the years A.D. 301 and 1205 inclusive. It will be seen that this list does not correspond with that given in Mr. Hosie's communication to NATURE of June 5. In the above interval Mr. Hosie records twenty-four spots not mentioned in Mr. Williams's paper; and in the latter there are nine recorded that do not occur in the longer list of Mr. Hosie. The number of naked eye records of sun-spots that may be brought to light will never be sufficient to carry back Dr. Wolf's sun-spot periods previous to the introduction of the telescope. There is, however, another Chinese record that it would be interesting to see translated. Mr. Williams, in the paper referred to, says, “these observations are continued in the supplement to Ma Twan Lin's Encyclopædia,” and that he had found in the history of the Ming dynasty many observations of solar spots, the latest being November 29, 1638.
Article PDF
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
JOHNSON, S. Early Sun-Spot Records. Nature 20, 146 (1879). https://doi.org/10.1038/020146c0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/020146c0
Comments
By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.