1989 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
EUROPEAN ASTRONOMICAL KNOWLEDGE INTRODUCED INTO CHINA IN THE MID-17TH CENTURY
| Project/Area Number |
63580081
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for General Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Research Field |
科学技術史(含科学社会学・科学技術基礎理論)
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| Research Institution | KANSAI UNIVERSITY |
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Principal Investigator |
HASHIMOTO Keizo KANSAI UNIV., PROFESSOR, 社会学部, 教授 (40067666)
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| Project Period (FY) |
1988 – 1989
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| Keywords | Astronomical Reform / Late Ming China / Star Atlas / Western Method / Traditional Asterism / Heng Xing Li Zhi / Jian Jie Zong Xing Tu / Xeng Xing Zong Tu |
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| Research Abstract |
During the astronomical reform in the late Ming period, several star atlases were prepared for the purposes of demonstrating the successful progress of it as well as incorporating the Western method in the traditional one and establishing the solid basis of the current astronomical enterprise by the state. What we have made clear here is an example of the results of the remarkable incorporation of such star-mapping at the Zhong-chen astronomical reform, and is the sequel to our treatise on the "Chi Dao Nan Bei Liang Xing Zong Tu" (1983).
In the treatise, however, we were not ready to recognize the crucial meaning of the ",Jian Jie Zong Xing Tu", partly because we had not found yet another independent version of the planisphere although we had in fact found the so far missing star-map itself from the Heng Xing Li Zhi, ch.4, or the Heng Xing Jing Wei Tu Shuo, at the Bibliotheque nationale in Paris in 1983, and partly because we missed to find the reason why the independent atlas, which has been preserved at the same place, carries the same title with almost the same content, so as to study it more seriously to identify them. Now, thanks to the present grant-in-aid and to collaboration of our colleague in Paris, we are able to make clear of the characteristic feature of it. This is one of the main results of the present project.
In the "Jian Jie Zong Xing Tu" we find the encircled 28 Chinese traditional asterisms just inside the marginal rim, carrying degree scales in the 3600 and the 12 equal division systems. The other planisphere, independently preserved, has the 28 asterisms coordinate division in the outmost rim with the other divisional systems altogether. This one also has the declination scale in degree from the north pole to the marginal rim, which we do not see in the first one. The second one must be the Heng Xing Zong Tu, prepared in 1631.
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