Aristarchus of Samos

From Philosopedia

Aristarchus of Samos (c. 310—230 B.C.E.)

Aristarchus is the Greek astronomer credited with being the first to propose a heliocentric theory of the universe. Archimedes and Copernicus cited Aristarchus as believing that the earth moves around the sun and that the sun is at rest, also concluding that the sun is larger than the earth and that seasons are caused by the earth’s axis being inclined to the plane of the ecliptic. Only his treatise, “The Sizes and Distances of the Sun and Moon,” remains.

According to Julian Kane, professor of geology at Hofstra University, “the burning of the Great Library at Alexandria in the year 391 was considered an unsuccessful attempt by Christian zealots to destroy all records of Aristarchus, discoveries that the Church considered contrary to its dogma.”

It was not Copernicus who first proposed the movements of the planets around the Sun; it was Aristarchus, 1800 years earlier.

(See entry for Galileo.

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