Cosmic Events: The Three Comets of 1618

by Clifford J. Cunningham (Editor)

Overview

This book showcases a wide-ranging study of the comets of 1618. That year came to be regarded as a turning point in European history, marking the start of the Thirty Years’ War, which was the most destructive conflict since ancient Roman times. Even while the Great Comet dominated the night sky in late 1618 and early 1619, the printing presses of Europe began disseminating news about it.

With the combined effort of 11 leading scholars in the history of astronomy, this book details the tremendous influence on human affairs made by the Great Comet and its two less luminous predecessors. Geographically-focused studies are presented on how the comets were studied in Spain, India and China. In England and The Netherlands, the tremendous creation of poetry sparked by the Great Comet is examined in-depth, with implications ranging from religion and politics to the death of members of the Royal Family and the origins of the English Civil War. The first study of an unpublished manuscript from Germany, among the most significant interventions on the comet of 1618, is presented with its magnificent color illustrations. Other chapters take a broader look on how the comets affected European thought in the visual and cultural arena, shedding new light on the dynamic and complex relationship between natural knowledge, world view, and forms of belief.

Ultimately, this book is written for researchers in historical astronomy and will be an interesting read for armchair astronomers, professionals, historians, and students alike.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9783031869495
Publisher:	Springer Nature Switzerland
Publication date:	09/27/2025
Series:	Historical & Cultural Astronomy
Pages:	420
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.25(h) x (d)

About the Author

Clifford J. Cunningham’s Ph.D. in history of astronomy dealt largely with William Herschel and the asteroids. He is Research Fellow in the Astrophysics Group at the University of Southern Queensland in Australia. He has written or edited 15 books on history of astronomy including a 5-volume history of early asteroid studies published by Springer. He is a Series Editor of Springer’s Historical & Cultural Astronomy books, Associate editor of the Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage and a member of the IAU. Asteroid (4276) was named Clifford in his honor in 1990. His discoveries include identifying Charles Burney Jr. as the person who created the word 'asteroid' in 1802; showing Manilius introduced the numerical six magnitude system; and a description of the aurora borealis in Milton’s Paradise Lost which had eluded scholars for 350 years.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Introduction.- Chapter 2: The Comets of 1618 and the European Printing Press.- Chapter 3: The Visual Culture of the 1618 Comets.- Chapter 4: THE GREAT COMET OF 1618: An Archaeopoetic Study.- Chapter 5: The astronomical charts of the Jesuits: The Table of De tribus cometis years MDCXVIII Disputatio astronomica.- Chapter 6: The Comets of 1618 in Germany and Wilhelm Schickard’s Manuscript Treatise.- Chapter 7: THE COMETS OF 1618: Tales from India.- Chapter 8: Celestial Portents in 1615−1619 and the Manchu Overthrow of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).- Chapter 9: Comets over Iberia: Astronomical Observations, Cometary Theory and Astrological Prognostications in Spain and Portugal (1618).- Chapter 10: Writing Past Futures: Celestial Omens and the Historiography of the Thirty Years’ War.- Chapter 11: The Comets of 1618 and Astrological Prognostication in Seventeenth-Century England.