Ancient Eclipse

…seeing that Alyattes would not give up the Scythians when Kyaxares demanded them, there had arisen war between the Lydians and the Medes lasting five years; in which years the Medes often discomfited the Lydians and the Lydians often discomfited the Medes (and among others they fought also a battle by night): and as they still carried on the war with equally balanced fortune, in the sixth year a battle took place in which it happened, when the fight had begun, that suddenly the day became night. And this change of the day Thales the Milesian had foretold to the Ionians laying down as a limit this very year in which the change took place. The Lydians however and the Medes, when they saw that it had become night instead of day, ceased from their fighting and were much more eager both of them that peace should be made between them.

Herodotus (I.74) on the eclipse of 585 BC?

I’m preparing for the eclipse tomorrow and browsing on the first recorded prediction of a solar eclipse by Thales of Miletos. One interesting paper I found was on Electronic Antiquity – Herodotos’s Report on Thales’ Eclipse by Thomas Worthen. He argues that the eclipse in 585 BC wasn’t predicted by Thales, which I could live with.

The reason, he says, is that the chronology of Median kings would be messed up. If we are talking about the eclipse of 585 then it was fought by a king who had been dead for a few years years. Instead he argues that it was a total lunar eclipse that was the observed omen. This is feasible as lunar eclipses are to a large degree predictable with ancient methods. The only factors that cause serious problems are that it might occur when the moon isn’t visible in the sky, or else be obscured by cloud. The solar eclipse would have been known from 585 and Herodotos, Worthen says, confused the two. Thales then became credited with an observation which simply wasn’t possible with the state of knowledge at the time.

It’s an interesting idea, and I’ll have to read around the chronologies to assess it. My favoured explanation is that people are predicting dire events all the time, but it’s only the right predictions that are recorded.

Starry Night’s reconstruction of the ancient eclipse as seen from modern Istanbul – or at least what modern Istanbul would look like if Istanbul were a lake surrounded by mountains rather, as is more commonly accepted, a city.

—–