J/A+A/567/A26 New standards in 18th century astrometry (Lequeux, 2014)
From Flamsteed to Piazzi and Lalande: new standards in 18th century astrometry.
Lequeux J.
<Astron. Astrophys. 567, A26 (2014)>
=2014A&A...567A..26L 2014A&A...567A..26L
ADC_Keywords: Positional data ; Surveys
Keywords: history and philosophy of astronomy - astrometry - catalogs
Abstract:
The present high accuracy of stellar positions and proper motions
allows us to determine the positional accuracy of old stellar
catalogues. This has already been done for the most important
catalogues from before the 18th century. Our aim is to extend this
study to several 18th century catalogues.
To do this, I studied ten catalogues: those of Flamsteed and Romer,
four catalogues of La Caille, and catalogues of Tobias Mayer, Bradley,
Piazzi, and Lalande. A comparison with modern data, mostly from
Hipparcos, compiled in the Simbad data base of the CDS allowed me to
determine the position errors of these catalogues. I also compared the
stellar visual magnitudes given in eight of these catalogues with
photometric V magnitudes.
Thanks to novel instruments, the r.m.s. positional accuracy improved
from thousands to hundreds of arc seconds in older catalogues to less
than one minute in that of Flamsteed, and to 2-6 arcseconds in the
other catalogues I examined. These improvements allowed for the first
time relatively accurate proper motions to be determined by 19th
century astronomers.
Description:
Catalogue of Flamsteed (flamstee.dat):
John Flamsteed (1646-1719) was the first astronomer in charge of
Greenwich Observatory. His stellar catalogue (Flamsteed 1725) was
built on observations from 1675 to 1683 with a 6-feet radius sextant
mounted on an axis parallel to the polar axis of the Earth, then from
1683 to 1719 with a mural circle with a radius of 79.5 inches (2m).
220 stars over 3925.
Catalogue of Romer (romer.dat):
Ole (or Olaus) Romer (1644-1710) is principally known for his
1676 discovery of the finite velocity of light, a discovery that he
shared with Jean-Dominique Cassini. After a long stay in Paris, he
returned to Copenhagen in 1681 and was appointed professor of
astronomy at the University. The observatory and all the observations
were destroyed in the great Copenhagen fire of 1728, with the
exception of observations of 88 stars obtained during three observing
nights, from 20 to 23 October 1706.
La Caille's catalogue of fundamental stars (lacaifun.dat):
Nicolas-Louis La Caille (or Lacaille, or de la Caille, 1713-1762) was
a French astronomer who is remembered principally for his survey of
the southern sky, where he introduced 14 new constellations that are
still in use today. Before leaving for the Cape of Good Hope in 1750,
he started a catalogue of the 400 brightest stars of both hemispheres,
which he completed during his stays in Cape Town and in the Mauritius
island, then after his return to Paris in 1754. He reduced the
observations himself, including for the first time corrections for
aberration and nutation, and published them with details of the
observations and reductions (La Caille 1757).
Bailly's adaptation of La Caille's catalogue of fundamental
stars (bailly.dat):
After the death of La Caille, Jean-Sylvain Bailly published a
catalogue of the brighest stars of both hemispheres for the equinox
B1750.0 in Ephemerides for 10 year from 1765 to 1775 (Anonymous
(Bailly) 1763, p. lvii-lxiv). This catalogue obviously derives from
the catalogue named lacaillefund.dat.
La Caille's complete survey of the southern sky (lacaisur.dat):
During his stay in Cape Town in 1751-1752, La Caille made the first
systematic survey of the sky ever, in the modern sense.
244 stars over 9766.
La Caille's catalogue of zodiacal stars (lacaizod.dat):
When La Caille returned from his southern expedition in 1754, he
undertook the construction of a catalogue of zodiacal stars.
Mayer's zodiacal catalogue (mayer.dat):
At exactly the same time as La Caille, Tobias Mayer (1723-1762) in
Gottingen undertook a similar catalogue of zodiacal stars, using a
6-feet radius mural quadrant made by John Bird (1709-1776).
200 stars over 998.
Bradley's stellar catalogue (bradley.dat):
James Bradley (1693-1762) is famous for his discovery of aberration
and nutation. From 1750 to his death in 1762, he built a large stellar
catalogue, from observations first with an old mural sector and after
1753 with the Bird 8-ft mural sector located in Greenwich, where it
215 stars over 3220.
Piazzi's stellar catalogue (piazzi.dat):
Giuseppe Piazzi (1746-1846) built a large catalogue containing 7646
stars from 1792 to 1813, observed in Palermo with an altazimuthal
circle of Jesse Ramsden (1735-1800) can still be seen.
202 stars over 7646.
Lalande's stellar catalogue (lalande.dat):
L'Histoire celeste francaise de Lalande (Lalande 1801), which
contains the unreduced observations of approximately 40,000 stars, is
the first very large stellar catalogue.
198 stars over ∼45000.
File Summary:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FileName Lrecl Records Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ReadMe 80 . This file
flamstee.dat 50 220 Flamsteed (from Lalande 1783)
romer.dat 42 88 Romer (from Galle 1845)
lacaifun.dat 52 398 La Caille, fundamental stars (La Caille, 1757)
bailly.dat 54 307 La Caille/Bailly, fundamental stars
(Anonymous (Bailly) 1763)
lacaisur.dat 58 244 La Caille, southern survey (La Caille, 1847)
lacaizod.dat 59 515 La Caille, zodiacal stars
(Anonymous (Bailly) 1763)
mayer.dat 59 200 Mayer, zodiacal stars (from Baily 1831)
bradley.dat 57 215 Bradley (from Bessel 1818)
piazzi.dat 60 203 Piazzi (Piazzi 1814)
lalande.dat 58 198 Lalande (from Bossert 1892)
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: flamstee.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 10 A10 --- Name Star name
11 A1 --- u_Name [?] Uncertainty on name
13- 15 F3.1 mag mag ?=- Catalog visual magnitude
17- 19 I3 deg ELONd Ecliptic longitude (Ep B1690.0)
21- 22 I2 arcmin ELONm Ecliptic longitude (Ep B1690.0)
24- 25 I2 arcsec ELONs Ecliptic longitude (Ep B1690.0)
27 A1 --- ELAT- Ecliptic latitude (Ep B1690.0)
28- 29 I2 deg ELATd Ecliptic latitude (Ep B1690.0)
31- 32 I2 arcmin ELATm Ecliptic latitude (Ep B1690.0)
34- 35 I2 arcsec ELATs Ecliptic latitude (Ep B1690.0)
37- 50 A14 --- Rem Remarks
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: romer.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 9 A9 --- Name Star name
13- 15 I3 deg RAd [0/360] Right ascension (Ep B1706)
17- 18 I2 arcmin RAm Right ascension (Ep B1706)
20- 23 F4.1 arcsec RAs Right ascension (Ep B1706)
25 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (Ep B1706)
26- 27 I2 deg DEd ?=- Declination (Ep B1706)
29- 30 I2 arcmin DEm ?=- Declination (Ep B1706)
32- 35 F4.1 arcsec DEs ?=- Declination (Ep B1706)
37- 54 A18 --- Rem Remarks
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: lacaifun.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 10 A10 --- Name Star name
11 A1 --- u_Name [?] Uncertainty on name
13- 15 F3.1 mag mag ?=- Catalog visual magnitude
17- 19 I3 deg RAd [0/360] Right ascension (Ep B1750)
21- 22 I2 arcmin RAm Right ascension (Ep B1750)
24- 27 F4.1 arcsec RAs Right ascension (Ep B1750)
29 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (Ep B1750)
30- 31 I2 deg DEd Declination (Ep B1750)
33- 34 I2 arcmin DEm Declination (Ep B1750)
36- 39 F4.1 arcsec DEs Declination (Ep B1750)
41- 52 A12 --- Rem Remarks
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: lacaisur.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 4 I4 --- Seq Sequential number
6- 17 A12 --- Name Star name
18 A1 --- u_Name [?] Uncertainty on name
20- 22 F3.1 mag mag Catalog visual magnitude
24- 25 I2 h RAh Right ascension (Ep B1750)
27- 28 I2 min RAm Right ascension (Ep B1750)
30- 33 F4.1 s RAs Right ascension (Ep B1750)
35 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (Ep B1750)
36- 37 I2 deg DEd Declination (Ep B1750)
39- 40 I2 arcmin DEm Declination (Ep B1750)
42- 43 I2 arcsec DEs Declination (Ep B1750)
45- 58 A14 --- Rem Remarks
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: bailly.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 9 A9 --- Name Star name
13- 15 I3 deg RAd [0/360] Right ascension (Ep B1750)
17- 18 I2 arcmin RAm Right ascension (Ep B1750)
20- 23 F4.1 arcsec RAs Right ascension (Ep B1750)
25 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (Ep B1750)
26- 27 I2 deg DEd ?=- Declination (Ep B1750)
29- 30 I2 arcmin DEm ?=- Declination (Ep B1750)
32- 35 F4.1 arcsec DEs ?=- Declination (Ep B1750)
37- 54 A18 --- Rem Remarks
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: bradley.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 4 I4 --- Seq Sequential number
6- 15 A10 --- Name Star name
16 A1 --- u_Name [?] Uncertainty on name
18- 20 F3.1 mag mag ?=- Catalog visual magnitude
22- 24 I3 deg RAd [0/360] Right ascension (Ep B1755)
26- 27 I2 arcmin RAm Right ascension (Ep B1755)
29- 32 F4.1 arcsec RAs Right ascension (Ep B1755)
34 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (Ep B1755)
35- 36 I2 deg DEd Declination (Ep B1755)
38- 39 I2 arcmin DEm Declination (Ep B1755)
41- 44 F4.1 arcsec DEs Declination (Ep B1755)
46- 59 A14 --- Rem Remarks
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: lacaizod.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 4 I4 --- Seq Sequential number
6- 15 A10 --- Name Star name
16 A1 --- u_Name [?] Uncertainty on name
18- 20 F3.1 mag mag ?=- Catalog visual magnitude
22- 24 I3 deg RAd [0/360] Right ascension (Ep B1765)
26- 27 I2 arcmin RAm Right ascension (Ep B1765)
29- 32 F4.1 arcsec RAs Right ascension (Ep B1765)
34 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (Ep B1765)
35- 36 I2 deg DEd Declination (Ep B1765)
38- 39 I2 arcmin DEm Declination (Ep B1765)
41- 44 F4.1 arcsec DEs Declination (Ep B1765)
46- 59 A14 --- Rem Remarks
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Byte-by-byte Description of file: mayer.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 4 I4 --- Seq Sequential number
6- 15 A10 --- Name Star name
16 A1 --- u_Name [?] Uncertainty on name
18- 20 F3.1 mag mag ?=- Catalog visual magnitude
22- 24 I3 deg RAd [0/360] Right ascension (Ep B1756)
26- 27 I2 arcmin RAm Right ascension (Ep B1756)
29- 32 F4.1 arcsec RAs Right ascension (Ep B1756)
34 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (Ep B1756)
35- 36 I2 deg DEd Declination (Ep B1756)
38- 39 I2 arcmin DEm Declination (Ep B1756)
41- 44 F4.1 arcsec DEs Declination (Ep B1756)
46- 59 A14 --- Rem Remarks
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: piazzi.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 2 I2 h RAh Hours of right ascension (Ep 1800)
4- 6 I3 --- Seq Sequential number
8- 17 A10 --- Name Star name
20- 22 F3.1 mag mag ?=- Catalog visual magnitude
24- 26 I3 deg RAd [0/360] Right ascension (Ep 1800)
28- 29 I2 arcmin RAm Right ascension (Ep 1800)
31- 34 F4.1 arcsec RAs Right ascension (Ep 1800)
36 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (Ep 1800)
37- 38 I2 deg DEd Declination (Ep 1800)
40- 41 I2 arcmin DEm Declination (Ep 1800)
43- 46 F4.1 arcsec DEs Declination (Ep 1800)
48- 60 A13 --- Rem Remarks
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: lalande.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 4 I4 --- Seq Sequential number
6- 17 A12 --- Name Star name
19- 21 F3.1 mag mag ?=- Catalog visual magnitude
23- 24 I2 h RAh Right ascension (Ep B1800)
26- 27 I2 min RAm Right ascension (Ep B1800)
29- 33 F5.2 s RAs Right ascension (Ep B1800)
35- 43 F9.5 deg DEdeg Declination (Ep B1800)
45- 58 A14 --- Rem Remarks
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Acknowledgements:
James Lequeux, James.Lequeux(at)obspm.fr
References:
Anonymous (Baily) 1763, Ephemerides des mouvemens celestes, pour six annees,
depuis 1765 jusqu'en 1775, et pour le meridien de la ville de Paris
(Paris, Herissant)
Baily, F., 1831, Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society 4, 391
Bessel, F.W., 1818, Fundamenta astronomiae pro anno MDCCLV deducta ex
observationibus viri incomparabilis James Bradley in Specula Astronomica
Grenovicensi per annos 1750-1762 institutis (Frid Nicolovium, Regiomonti)
Brossert, J., 1892, Catalogue de 3950 etoiles ramenees a l'equinoxe de 1800,0
(Paris, Gauthier Villars et fils)
Flamsteed, J. 1725, Historia Coelestis Britannicae (London, Meere)
Galle, J.G. 1845, Olai Roemeri Triduum observationum astronomicarum a
MDCCVI. diebus Oct.bXX usque ad XXIII. institutarum reductum et cum
tabulis comparatum ab I.G. Galle (Typis Academicis, Berlin)
La Caille, N. L. de 1757, Astronomiae fundamenta novissimis solis et stellarum
observationibus stabilita Lutetiae in Collegio Mazarinaeo et in Africa ad
Caput Bonae Spei peractis (Paris, Collombat)
La Caille, N.L. de, Henderson, T. & Baily, F. 1847, A Catalogue of 9766 Stars
in the Southern Hemisphere for the Beginning of the Year 1750... (London,
Richard & John E. Taylor)
Lalande, J. de 1783, Ephemerides des mouvemens celestes pour le meridien
de Paris, tome huitieme (Paris, Vve Herissant), p. 17-72.
(End) Patricia Vannier [CDS] 20-May-2014