Abstract
Early in the seventeenth century, the telescope spread quickly to Asia, largely through the V.O.C. (Dutch East Indies Company) officials and Christian missionaries who often carried telescopes as diplomatic gifts for the king of their host countries. However, the story of the influx of telescopes into Iran remains a mystery, although there are a few records that reveal that by the 1660s at least one telescope had arrived to Iran, and that the Capuchin, Raphaël du Mans, may have built one in Isfahan.
However, Modern Astronomy was only introduced into Persia in the mid-nineteenth century, during the rule of Naser al-Din Shah of the Qajar Dynasty (1785–1925). Founded in 1851, the Dar al-Funun was Iran’s first secular institution of higher learning, and astronomy was one of the fields of study offered there. After graduating, the best Dar al-Funun students travelled to Europe to complete their education, while many university educated Westerners moved to Iran to become teachers at the Dar al-Funun. But although great efforts were put into introducing Modern Science in Qajar Iran, the adoption of Modern Astronomy was extremely slow. This paper aims to shed light on the reasons for this. The Qajar prince Etezad al-Saltane, Director of the Dar al-Funun and the first Minister of Sciences, played a fundamental role in trying to facilitate the introduction of Modern Astronomy in Persia. Next to him, two others who played an important role in the introduction of Modern Astronomy in Iran were the Court Astronomer Abdull Ghaffar Najm al-Dawleh and Mahmod Kham Qomi who spent 7 years in Paris and Brussels and upon his return to Iran tried unsuccessfully to convince the King to build an astronomical observatory.
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Notes
- 1.
al-Ṣūfī: Azophi (22.1° S; 12.7° E; ϕ: 47.05 km; named in 1935); al-Bīrunī: Al-Biruni (17.9° N; 92.5° E; ϕ: 77.05 km; named in 1970 al-Ṭūsī: Nasireddin (41° S; 0.2° E; ϕ: 52.05 km; named in 1935). In all, 24 craters on the Moon have names of Arabic and Islamic origin, bearing witness to famous Arabian or Persian scholars. For a detailed list of these craters with full names of the scholars they refer to and their coordinates, see: “Illustrious Names in the Heavens …”
- 2.
In the course of his Ph.D. research on al-Ṣūfī’s Book of the Fixed Stars Hafez (2010) was able to track down 35 copies located in 20 libraries in the following countries: Denmark, Egypt, England, France, Germany, India, Iran, Italy, Lebanon, Qatar, Russia, Spain, Tunisia, Turkey and the USA (see Hafez et al., 2011: 129). Although “… the original manuscript, written by al-Ṣūfī, has not survived … we do have the next best thing—a copy made by his son.” (Hafez et al., 2011: 130). This is MS5036 in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, which was scribed in 1009, just 23 years after al-Sūfī’s death.
- 3.
This is a direct translation, but if we want to adopt the terminology used at the time in Europe, then it should be referred to as a ‘spyglass’.
- 4.
According to Blanchard (pers. comm., February 2016), it is unlikely that d’Orleans ever travelled to Iran. He argues that if d’Orleans had travelled outside of France at anytime, it could only have been between 1642 and 1665.
- 5.
In the history of optics, another important Capuchin was Father Anian (G. Blanchard, pers. comm., February 2016).
- 6.
- 7.
Isahaya (2013) make an interesting comparative analysis of the first translations of treatises on Modern Astronomy done in Iran and in Japan. He concludes that in both cases the translators should be considered linguists, as they were not astronomers. Rather than advanced astronomical works, the books can be categorized as being for a general readership, and later intellectuals familiar with astronomy declared their dissatisfaction with these first translations. Finally, both translators regarded works on Western Astronomy as lying outside their own astronomical traditions.
- 8.
Ferdowsi, Shahnameh. This poem is inscribed on the upper façade of the main entrance of Dar al-Funun.
- 9.
Hermann Mayer Salomon Goldschmidt (1802–1866) was born in Frankfurt, Germany, but moved to Paris in 1836 to continue his training as a painter. However, he soon fell under the spell of Paris Observatory’s Le Verrier and decided to devote his life to astronomy. Using a succession of small telescopes he searched successfully for new asteroids, and between 1852 and 1861 made 14 discoveries (61 Danaë was his thirteenth). As a result, in 1861 he was awarded the Royal Astronomical Society’s Gold Medal (Anonymous, 1867).
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Acknowledgments
Special thanks are due to Tofigh Heidarzadeh for sharing with me literature, contacts with leading historians of astronomy in Iran, and for his support; and also special thanks to Fariba Payerband Sabet. Thanks are due as well to Kamram Arjomand, Fahrhad Atai, Guillaume Blanchard, Ghazaal Bozorghmehr, Keyhan Darvishi, Maryam Ehktiar, Rana Javadi, Kazem Kokakam, James Lequeux Peter Louwman, Negar Navabi, Pouria Nazemi Volker Remmert, Francis Richard, Erhard Scholz, Evan Siegel, Mohammad Reza Tahmasbpour, Debora Velleuer, Henk Zoomers and Huib J. Zuidervaart. For his excellent and generous editorial work, I should like to thank Wayne Orchiston. Special thanks are due to IPIW at Bergische Universität Wuppertal for a generous travel grant, which enabled me to attend the ICOA 9 Conference in Pune.
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González, C.P. (2019). On the Transfer of Technology and Knowledge in Iran During the Naseri Period (1848–1896). In: Orchiston, W., Sule, A., Vahia, M. (eds) The Growth and Development of Astronomy and Astrophysics in India and the Asia-Pacific Region. Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings, vol 54. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-3645-4_25
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