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Article ID: CBB278710853

The Moon’s ashen light and libration in Leonardo and Galileo (2022)

Tucci, Pasquale (Author)

Quaderni di Storia della Fisica
Volume: 26
Issue: 1
Pages: 21-60
Publication date: 2022
Language: English

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1393/qsf/i2022-10087-0

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Visual perception Development of science; change in science Scientific illustration Heliocentrism Geocentrism Oscillation Moon Light Renaissance Galilei, Galileo Leonardo da Vinci

In the paper I analyse the contributions of Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) and Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) to the interpretation of the lunar ashen light and libration. Both authors referred to the more general context of the relationships between the Sun, the Moon, the Earth, the planets and they highlighted some relationships with the theoretical and observational context of reference: the geocentric/Ptolemaic one for Leonardo and the heliocentric/Copernican one for Galileo. Leonardo is credited with being the first who interpreted the phenomenon of the ashen light for astronomical purposes. But Leonardo’s interpretation differs from the Galilean one, as well as from the modern one. The lunar libration is probably found in one of Leonardo’s three drawings of the Moon, but it was not noticed by the Vincian. In the watercolour images of the Moon (1609/1610) and in those published in the Sydereus Nuncius (1610) Galileo involuntarily recorded the libration. But only in the Dialogo (1632) do we find a first partial description and interpretation of the phenomenon. I will show how Leonardo’s observations of the Moon with the naked eye are not comparable with those Galileo made with the telescope. Its use, however, is not sufficient to explain the great diversity between Leonardo’s fragmentary arguments and Galileo’s highly articulated ones. Only the emergence of new styles of thinking and of visual and observational practices help to better understand the great phenomenon that many historians called “The Scientific Revolution”, in order to underline its novelty in the field of philosophical and scientific knowledge.

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