Thomas Harriot's Moon Map


Thomas Harriot (1560-1621) was an English astronomer, mathematician, ethnographer, and translator.

His observations were amongst the first uses of a telescope for astronomy.

Harriot is now credited as the first astronomer to draw an astronomical object after viewing it through a telescope: he drew a map of the Moon on July 26, 1609, preceding Galileo by several months.


Harriot marked prominent features with numbers and letters - probably as positioning guidelines. Some can be easily identified with today's names:


 1 - Plato
 3 - Grimaldi
 18 - Mare Crisium
 38 - Tycho
 b - Copernicus
 c - Kepler
 e - Aristarchus
 h - Timocharis
 x - Langrenus

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Text based on Wikipedia,
License: CC-by-SA 3.0

License of the map: Public Domain