Durham E-Theses Investigation of some astronomical phenomena in medieval Arabic chronicles Al-Trabulsy, Hussain Ali M. How to cite: Al-Trabulsy, Hussain Ali M. (1993) Investigation of some astronomical phenomena in medieval Arabic chronicles, Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/5691/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk 2 INVESTIGATION OF SOME ASTRONOMICAL PHENOMENA IN MEDIEVAL ARABIC CHRONICLES BY Hussain Ali M. al-Trabulsy The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. No quotation from it should be published without his prior written consent and information derived from it should be acknowledged. A thesis submitted to the University of Durham for the degree of Master of science September 1993 1 5 JUN 1994 To My Father, Loving Memory of My Mother And My Wife Um Ali INVESTIGATION OF SOME ASTRONOMICAL PHENOMENA IN MEDIEVAL ARABIC CHRONICLES By Hussain A. M. al-Trabulsy A thesis submitted to the University of Durham for the degree of Master of Science September 1993 ABSTRACT Medieval Arabic observational records of comets, meteors, meteor showers, solar and lunar eclipses are translated from the original Arabic chronicles. A comparison is made between each Arabic cometary record with East Asian observations. Specific investigation of Halley's comet has been made. The frequency of meteor showers is compared with the known prominent meteor showers. The recorded observations of different types of solar and lunar eclipses have been studied. The accuracy in the recording of the time of beginning and ending and the magnitude of the eclipse are also studied and compared with the present-day calculations. In addition, the different methods of recording of the local time of the eclipse and the magnitude are discussed. Table of Contents 1 THE FIRST CHAPTER GENERAL INTRODUCTION 1 - 21 1.1 Applied Historical astronomy 1 1.2 Pre-Islamic astronomy 5 1.3 Islamic astronomy until AD.750 7 1.4 Islamic astronomy after AD.750 8 1.5 Astronomical time-keeping 13 1.5.1 Prayer times 13 1.5.2 Qibla direction 16 1.5.3 Islamic Dates 16 1.6 Definitions of some Islamic terms 18 1.7 Format of entry 19 2 THE SECOND CHAPTER A SHORT BIOGRAPHY OF MUSLIM CHRONICLERS CONSULTED 22 - 36 2.1 Introduction 22 2.2 Names of Arabs 23 2.3 Chroniclers 23 3 THE THIRD CHAPTER INVESTIGATION OF COMETARY OBSERVATIONS 37 - 92 3.1 Introduction 37 3.2 Records of comets in history 38 3.2.1 Chinese records 38 3.2.2 Babylonians records 39 3.2.3 Medieval Europe 39 3.2.4 Medieval Islamic 40 ( 3.2.4.1 Astronomers 41 3.2.4.2 Astrologers 42 3.2.4.3 Chroniclers 43 3.3 Search for Halley's Comet 44 3.4 Identification of cometary records 49 3.5 Halley's Comet in medieval Arabic records 57 3.6 Other comets in medieval Arabic records 65 3.7 Conclusion 88 4 THE FOURTH CHAPTER INVESTIGATION OF METEORS AND METEOR SHOWERS 93 - 126 4.1 Introduction 93 4.2 Meteors 94 4.3 Meteor showers 96 4.4 Meteor and Meteor showers in the medieval Islamic Period 101 4.4.1 Records of individual Meteors 103 4.4.2 Records of Meteor shower 116 4.5 Conclusion 124 5 THE FIFTH CHAPTER INVESTIGATION OF SOLAR ECLIPSES 127 - 154 5.1 Introduction 127 5.2 Total solar eclipse 128 5.3 Annular solar eclipse 130 5.4 Partial solar eclipse 131 5.5 Recording of magnitude .and local time 132 5.6 Discussion of individual solar eclipse 139 5.7 Conclusion 153 6 THE SIXTH CHAPTER INVESTIGATION OF LUNAR ECLIPSES 155 - 179 6.1 Introduction 155 6.2 Description of lunar eclipses in Arabic chronicles 155 6.3 Records of individual lunar eclipse 163 6.4 Conclusion 179 7 THE SEVENTH CHAPTER GENERAL CONCLUSION 180 - 184 8 ACKNOWLEOOEMENTS 185 9 REFERENCES 186 - 191 10 ARABIC REFERENCES 192 11 Appendix 193 - 203 Table of tables (1.1) Independet techniques to estimate n 2 (1.2) Five daily prayers in Islam 14 (1.3) Angle of solar depression to determine the time of Fajr and Isha prayers 15 ( 1. 4) Arabic names of the lunar months 18 ( 1. 5) Geographical co-ordinates of some places 21 (2.1) Summary of Muslim chroniclers 36 ( 3 .1) Perihelion passage time of every returns of pjHalley's during the Islamic era 50 (3.2) The orbital elements of every return of p/Halley during the Islamic era 51 ( 3. 3) Commonly used terms for a comet in Arabic chronicles 53 (3.4) Summary of observations for p/Halley in Arabic chronicles 55 ( 3. 5) Comparison between observations of Arabs and Chinese for p/Halley 56 (3.6) Summary of the visibility dates for recorded comets~\ (4.1) the prominent annular meteor showers 100 (4.2) Summary for known recorded meteors 115 (4.3) Arabic expressions for describing meteors 116 (4.4) Summary of recorded meteors showers 125 (5.1) Summary of the observed solar eclipses 134 ( 5. 2) Comparison between observed and computed magnitude for solar eclipses 135 l (5.3) Rcorded local times of solar eclipses 137 (5.4) Comparison between recorded and computed local times (reduced) for solar eclipses 138 (6.1) Summary of the observed lunar eclipses 157 ( 6. 2) Comparison between observed and computed magnitude for lunar eclipses 159 (6.3) Rcorded local times of lunar eclipses 160 (6.4) Comparison between recorded and computed local times (reduced) for lunar eclipses 161 Table of Figures Fig. ( 3.1) Three different calculations for perihelion passage's date of p/Halley 52 Fig. (3.2) Computed distance of p/Hall~y in every return during the history 54 Fig. (4.1) Diminution of meteorite's velocity virsus different mass 97 Fig. (4.2a) A compact swarm of meteoroids· 98 Fig. ( 4. 2b) Spread the meteoroids along orbit 98 Fig. (4.3) Monthly frequency of meteor showers 126 Fig. (5.1) Comparison between observed and computed magnitude of solar eclipses 136 Fig. (6.1) Comparison between Ibn Iyas's observations and computed durations of Lunar eclipses 162 1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 1.1 Applied Historical Astronomy Every major civilization has contributed to the historical records of astronomical phenomena, but the most significant contributions have been from Europe, the Far East (China, Korea, Japan), Babylon and the Arab dominions. Undoubtedly, all ancient and medieval observations were made with the unaided eye and are thus of low precision. Nevertheless, these observations have played a major part in our understanding of the field of applied historical astronomy in its four basic areas. These are: (1) The study of the rotation of the Earth and the motion of the Moon. Halley (1695) discovered the Moon's acceleration apparently using ancient observations of eclipses preserved by Ptolemy and the Arabs. Many attempts after Halley were made to calculate this same acceleration. A gradual increase in the length of the day (LOD) can also be determined from early observations. This is mainly caused by tidal friction, which is gradually slowing down the rotation of the Earth and decreasing the orbital angular velocity of the Moon. In recent years, different techniques have been made to determine the Moon's acceleration n and they are in fairly good agreement, see table ( 1. 1 ) . Recently, the most detailed study of the rotation of the Earth over the past 2700 years was made by Stephenson and Morrison (1984), using a variety of astronomical observations. They used exclusively solar and lunar eclipses throughout the pre-telescopic period, whereas occultations of stars by the Moon were used for the telescopic period (which began at AD.1610). They deduced that the mean rate of increase in the LOD between about 400 BC. and AD.948 was 2.43 msjcy, approximately the theoretical tidal figure. For the last millennium, the LOD was found by them to have diminished to approximately 1.4 msjcy, equivalent to a major increase in the non-tidal component. The Earth's rotational clock error AT which was derived in both cases was as follows: (Before AD.948) Ll T = 1360 + 320 t + 44.3 t 2 (Since AD.948) L1T=25.5t 2 where t is the time in centuries from AD.1800. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Method Investigator( e) n (arcsec;cy) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Transits of Mercury Morrison & Ward (1975) - 26 .± 2 Numerical tidal model Lambeck (1980) - 29.6 ± 3.1 Artificial satellites Cazenave (1982) - 26.1 ::!:. 2.9 Lunar Laser ranging Dickey & Williams (1982) - 25.1::!:. 1.2 lunar occultations van Flandern (1982) -21.4 + 2.6 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------_, Table (1.1): Independent techniques to estimate the lunar tidal acceleration. ) 2 (2) The study of solar variability Telescopic observations of sunspots began in the early part of the 17th century. These telescopic data are used to study the approximately ten-year solar cycle, long term trends in solar activity, (see Eddy, 1976), and intervals of weak solar activity, Eddy (1977).