Johann Elert Bode is one of the greatest German astronomers famous for his “Titus-Bode Law” that became significant in determining the orbit from Uranus. Bode was born in Hamburg. His father, Johann Jakob Bode, worked as a merchant. During his childhood years, he suffered from an eye disease that caused blindness in his right eye. Unlike the rest of the astronomers, Bode never had formal schooling yet his father introduced him to merchandising.

Ptolemy, a Greek astronomer and geographer, lived in around 85 to 165 A.D. He was born in Egypt, and he died there too. Egypt was the center of learning in those times, and it was there that Ptolemy got his education. His name Ptolemy is, in fact, an Egyptian name, while Claudius is a Roman name. This indicates that he belonged to a Greek family that lived in Egypt and that had been bestowed the honor of being a Roman [...]

Photo by: Creative Commons Hipparchus, a famous Greek mathematician and astronomer, was born in 190 BC in what is now Turkey. He may not be as famous today as Euclid, Pythagoras and other Greek luminaries, but during his time, he was greatly renowned. His mathematical achievements were considered exceptional by his contemporaries and many future generations. Simply put, he was a legend, and his face adorned coins that were in circulation for many decades in that period.

Eratosthenes was a prominent Greek mathematician, astronomer and geographer who lived between 276 BC and 194 BC. He was born in what is now Libya, to parents who were probably Chaldean. Eratosthenes is famous for many things, including a mapping method that used latitudes and longitudes, and his accurate computation of the circumference of earth. To compute for the circumference of the earth, Eratosthenes used the principles of trigonometry and available data on the altitude of the sun in two [...]