Total Solar Eclipses
Very spectacular -- night falls in mid-day
- Birds roost for night
- stars come out
Ancients very concerned
- Sun extremely important for life
- Pyramids of Sun and Moon -- Teotihuacan near Mexico City
- Re, Egyptian sun god
- Other than eclipses, Sun very reliable
- it will rise tomorrow ~ 6 AM
- One of first job of Astronomers was to predict Solar eclipses
- failure could lead to execution (China)
- Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court
- eclipse during battle -- lead to victory