Since his very appearance on this planet man developed an
interest in stars and planets. First, he was struck by wonder and speculated
some forms in the constellations. Second after thousands of years of watching
them, he was impressed by the regularity in the movements. Here I remember Tycho Brahe who spent his entire lifetime recording the observation of
the stellar and planetary positions with his naked eye. These data’s analyzed
by his assistant Kepler and he was a deduction of the laws of the planetary
motion. This article fully covered the lifetime experience of Aryabhata, Varahamihira who sacrificed his life for astronomy.
Aryabhata
He was the most important personality in ancient Indian
astronomy. He was in the vanguard of the new astronomical movement. His work
called the aryabhatiya, was held in high esteem by the leading astronomers of
subsequent ages and has enjoyed many excellent commentaries. From it, we learn
that its author was 23 in AD.499 when he wrote this famous work. He calls
himself an asmaka, or one belonging to the asmaka country, the identification
of which is highly debated. Some identify it with Kerala. In his work, he says
that the apparent westward motion of the stationary nakshatras is due to the
rotation of the earth about its axis. He was the first Indian astronomer to
postulate this theory. Strangely, some of the later Indian astronomers bitterly
criticized him for this theory.
He initiated
two systems of reckoning the day: one reckoned the day from midnight at Lanka
and the other from sunrise at Lanka. However, he followed the midnight system
which Brahma Gupta also followed. In fact, the Babylonian elements transmitted
to India by the Greeks were developed into a fuller planetary theory by
Aryabhata. He did very much the same thing for Indian astronomy as Ptolemy had
done for the Greek
Varahamihira
He is the famous author of the Pancha siddhanika. Thus, he
was more a compiler and historian as astronomy than an astronomer of
originality. Further, he was more popular as an astrologer through his
compendious works like Brihatsamhita, yogayatra etc. hailing from Magadha, he
lived and worked in Ujjayini. His astrology and horosasira(horoscope) being of Greek
origin, abound in Greek technical terms.
He was the great
astrologer in India. His astrological prediction was very famous and accurate.
Most of his theory is correct in modern Astrophysics.
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