90 I COSMOS. 



anchiiii (probally of the third century after Christ), exam 

 med by myself elsewhere,^ and as they are met with in the 

 Egyptian monuments of the time of the Caesars, does not be 

 long to the ancient astronomy, but to the subsequent epochs, 

 M which astrological chimeras had become universally dif- 

 fused.! We must not be surprised that the Moon was in- 

 cluded in the series of the seven planets, since, with the ex- 

 ception of a memorable theory of attraction put forward by 

 Anaxagoras [Cosmos, vol, ii., p. 309, and note), its more 

 intimate connection with the Earth was scarcely ever sus- 

 pected by the ancients. On the contrary, according to an 

 opinion respecting the system of the world which Vitruvius^ 

 and Martianus Capella§ quote, without stating its originator, 

 Mercury and Venus, which we call planets, are represented 

 as satellites of the Sun, which itself revolves round the Earth, 



* Humboldt, Monumens des Peuples Indigenes de V Amerique, vol. ii., 

 p. 42-49. I have already directed attention in 1812 to the analogy be* 

 tw^een the zodiac ofB.iauchini and that oi'Dendera. Compare Letroune, 

 Observations Critiques sur les Representations Zodiacales, p. ^37 ; and 

 Lepsius, Chronologie der ^gypter, 1849, p. 80. 



t Letronne, Sur VOrigine du Zodiaqite Gi-ec, p. 29. Lepsius, Chro 

 not. der ^gypt., p. 83. Letronne opposes the old Chaldean origin of 

 the planetary week on account of the number seven. 



X Vitruv., De Archit., ix., 4 (ed. Rode, 1800, p. 209). Neither Vitru- 

 vius nor Martianus Capella mention the Egyptians as the originators of 

 a system, according to which Mexxury and Venus are considered as sat- 

 ellites of the planetary Sun. The former says, " Mercurii autem et Ve- 

 neris stellae circum Soils radios, solera ipsum, uti centrum, itineribus 

 coronantes, regressus retrorsum et retardationes faciunt." " But Mer 

 cury and Venus, which encircle in their orbits the Sun itself as a center 

 retrogress and proceed slowly round its rays." 



§ Martianus Mineus Felix Capella, De Nuptiis Philos. et Mercurii, lib. 

 viii. (ed. Grotii, 1599, p. 289): "For though Venus and Mercury appear 

 to rise and set daily, yet their orbits do not, however, go round the 

 Earth, but revolve round the Sun in a wider orbit. Li fact, the center 

 of their orbits is in the Sun, so that they are sometimes above it . . . ." 

 " Nam Venus Mercuriusque licet ortus occasusque quotidianos osten- 

 dant, tamen eorum circuli Terras omnino non ambiunt, sed circa Solem 

 laxiore ambitu circulantur. Denique circulorum suorum centrum in 



Sole constituunt, ita ut supra ipsum aliquando " As this place is 



written over, " Quod Tellus non sit centrum omnibus planetis," " Be- 

 cause the Earth is not the center of all the planets," it may certainly, as 

 Gassendi asserts, have had an influence upon the first views of Coper- 

 nicus, more than the passages attributed to the great geometer, Apol- 

 lonius of Perga. However, Copernicus only says, " Minima contcm- 

 nendum arbitror, quod Martianus Capella scripsit, existimans quod Ve- 

 uus et Mercurius circumerrant Solem in medio existentem." " I by no 

 means think that we should despise what Martianus Capella has writ- 

 ten, who supposes that Venus and Mercury revolve round the Sun, 

 which is fixed in the center " Compare Cosmos, vol. ii., p. 31^', and 

 »iote. 



