Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy V.
Speaker 1: Wilson and I'm Holly Frye. Before we start today's episode,
Speaker 1: one more time, we are going to do a live
Speaker 1: show at the Indiana Historical Society. This is on Friday,
Speaker 1: July nineteenth, twenty twenty four. So if you are listening
Speaker 1: to this podcast way in the future, twenty twenty four,
Speaker 1: that's the year we're talking about. This is going to
Speaker 1: be at the Eugene and Maryland Glick Indiana History Center
Speaker 1: again July nineteenth, twenty twenty four. Holly and I did
Speaker 1: a show there back before the pandemic started, had a
Speaker 1: great time. It's been a very long time since we've
Speaker 1: done a lot of live shows, so it's nice to
Speaker 1: be working toward doing some again. Yes, indeed, this will
Speaker 1: be from seven thirty to eight thirty. There will also
Speaker 1: be a meet and greet before the show, so folks
Speaker 1: can either buy a ticket to the show or a
Speaker 1: ticket that includes that meet and greet. And to get
Speaker 1: more information, you can go to www dot Indianahistory dot
Speaker 1: org slash events. And now we will move on to
Speaker 1: the actual episode. Back in twenty seventeen, when everyone in
Speaker 1: the world, it seemed like, was talking about the solar
Speaker 1: eclipse that was about to be visible from North America.
Speaker 1: Holly put together an episode on a handful of eclipses
Speaker 1: in history, and I don't think it really entered our
Speaker 1: minds at the time that in almost seven years after
Speaker 1: that there would be another total solar eclipse visible from
Speaker 1: North America, and that it would also, like that earlier one,
Speaker 1: be happening on a day when a new episode of
Speaker 1: our show comes out. For my pot art, pretty much
Speaker 1: the minute the twenty seventeen eclipse was over, the group
Speaker 1: of folks that I was traveling with started talking about
Speaker 1: where we should go to see the next one. Uh.
Speaker 1: I definitely though, was not thinking, hmm, what should we
Speaker 1: do on the podcast for the next solar eclipse? Uh?
Speaker 1: Did not enter my mind. But here we are, solar
Speaker 1: eclipse happening today on the day this podcast comes out.
Speaker 1: So I found another eclipse related topic. On May twenty eighth,
Speaker 1: in the year five eighty five BCE, there was a
Speaker 1: total solar eclipse during a battle between the kingdoms of
Speaker 1: Media and Lydia, and this eclipse had been predicted by
Speaker 1: Thailees of my leadas, and it led to the ends
Speaker 1: of both the battle and the war that the battle
Speaker 1: was a part of. Except turns out there is debate
Speaker 1: about every single thing that I just said that has
Speaker 1: been going on for centuries. We're going to be talking
Speaker 1: about these events and the debate around them. Also, according
Speaker 1: to Herodotus, one of the reasons that this battle was
Speaker 1: being fought involved a particularly horrific incident of cannibalism. So
Speaker 1: just heads up on that. The details surrounding the eclipse
Speaker 1: and the battle aren't the only subjects of debate in
Speaker 1: today's episode. Another is Stalley's of Militis himself. There are
Speaker 1: lots and lots of references to him in ancient writing,
Speaker 1: but we have no contemporary sources about his life. All
Speaker 1: the references we have on him first appeared in writing
Speaker 1: much much later. Let's just start with when he lived.
Speaker 1: One source on that is Diogenes Lartius, who was born
Speaker 1: around one eighty CE. Just to be clear, that is
Speaker 1: not the same person as Diogenes the Senic, who we
Speaker 1: have covered on the show before. Diogenes the senc lived
Speaker 1: a long time before Diogenes Laardius also, we are not
Speaker 1: going to pretend to try to say any of these
Speaker 1: names the way they were quote authentically pronounced. That's kind
Speaker 1: of not possible to piece together at this point. But
Speaker 1: Diogenes Laardiis was referencing a Polydorus of Athens, and a
Speaker 1: Polydorus of Athens was born around one eighty BCE, so
Speaker 1: these two men were born more than three hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty years apart, and then Thales was born another three
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty years or so before a Polydorus of Athens.
Speaker 1: Ancient Greek chroniclers and historians used Olympiads to count years,
Speaker 1: with each Olympiad spanning the four year period between Olympic Games.
Speaker 1: According to Diogenes, who was referencing a Polydorus, Thales died
Speaker 1: at the age of seventy eight and was born during
Speaker 1: the thirty fifth Olympiad that started in six forty BCE.
Speaker 1: He died during the fifty eighth Olympiad, which started in
Speaker 1: five forty eight BCE, but this would have made his
Speaker 1: age more like ninety not seventy eight. Most sources agree
Speaker 1: that there's a transcription error in the Olympiad of his birth,
Speaker 1: and that Thales was really born during the thirty ninth
Speaker 1: Olympiad that started in six twenty four BCE. So if
Speaker 1: you're keeping score, we have one source quoting another source,
Speaker 1: both of whom lived centuries later, and a mistake, and
Speaker 1: we are only three paragraphs into this thing. We also
Speaker 1: know very little about Thales's life, including who his parents were.
Speaker 1: There are some ancient sources that say his mother was Phoenician.
Speaker 1: Others give his parents names as Examise and Cleobulin, but
Speaker 1: we don't know anything about them either. Beyond those possible names,
Speaker 1: there is general agreement that he was born in Miletus
Speaker 1: in Ionia on the aeg and c. This was a
Speaker 1: trading hub and an intellectual center, and that's on the
Speaker 1: Aegean coast, in an area that today is part of Turkya.
Speaker 1: Guess what else. We don't have any surviving writing by
Speaker 1: Thales or any exact quotes of his writing in other
Speaker 1: later material. Instead, what we do have is lots and
Speaker 1: lots of descriptions of what he wrote about, and references
Speaker 1: to ideas that he put forth, and various facts and
Speaker 1: ideas that are attributed to him. So all that said,
Speaker 1: Thales was reportedly brilliant. He was named as one of
Speaker 1: the seven wise men or sopoy of Plato's Protagoras. Plato
Speaker 1: described Theales and these six other men as quote enthusiasts, lovers,
Speaker 1: and disciples of the Spartan culture. And you can recognize
Speaker 1: that character in their wisdom by the short, memorable sayings
Speaker 1: that fell from each of them. They assembled together and
Speaker 1: dedicated these as the first fruits of their lore to
Speaker 1: Apollo in his Delphic temple. So these maxims include things
Speaker 1: like no thyself and nothing in excess, both of which
Speaker 1: are attributed to Thales. He's also credited as being one
Speaker 1: of the founders of the Milesian school of philosophy, also
Speaker 1: called the Ionian school. The three figures most associated with
Speaker 1: this school are Thales, his student an Aximander, and an
Speaker 1: axemander student in Aximenes. All three had a focus on
Speaker 1: astronomy and cosmology, and all three put forth ideas about
Speaker 1: what the universe was fundamentally made of. Some of their
Speaker 1: ideas were really dissimilar, though, so some scholars described the
Speaker 1: Milesian school as more of a geographic descriptor than any
Speaker 1: kind of unified school of thought. Here are some ideas
Speaker 1: that various ancient sources attribute to Thales. Water or perhaps fluid,
Speaker 1: is the fundamental substance that makes up everything in the universe. Also,
Speaker 1: everything has a soul, which is sometimes described as gods
Speaker 1: residing in everything. This offered an explanation for magnetism. Loadstones
Speaker 1: could attract iron because of the souls that were residing
Speaker 1: within them. According to Aristotle, Sales described the Earth as
Speaker 1: floating on an infinite sea of water. Seneca said he
Speaker 1: used this floating earth to explain the cause of earthquakes.
Speaker 1: Of course, this is not what causes earthquakes, but this
Speaker 1: is sometimes described as a step away from blaming natural
Speaker 1: phenomena on the behavior of gods and towards a more
Speaker 1: rational and observable science. Side note, sources written today often
Speaker 1: describe Sale's concept of the earth as a flat disk
Speaker 1: floating on that water, but surviving references don't actually specify
Speaker 1: a shape for this floating earth. It's pretty easy to
Speaker 1: conclude that he meant that it was a disk, because
Speaker 1: if there were a globe floating on the water, how
Speaker 1: would the people on the underwater portion of it breathe? Like?
Speaker 1: Is there an atmosphere? Like? How is it working is
Speaker 1: it concased in something? Don't know? According to Aristotle, Anaximenes
Speaker 1: and an Aximander believed that the Earth was lats, but
Speaker 1: earlier in the same sentence that he mentioned them, he
Speaker 1: also said some people thought the earth was spherical? So
Speaker 1: does that some include bailies? If this description was meant
Speaker 1: to be in chronological order, it could have, but like,
Speaker 1: we just really don't know. The entry on Thales of
Speaker 1: my Ladas at the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy argues that
Speaker 1: Thales likely thought the Earth was a sphere for the
Speaker 1: same reasons that Aristotle did, including things like seeing ships
Speaker 1: sail away into the distance with their hulls disappearing below
Speaker 1: the horizon before their masts and sails. This entry doesn't
Speaker 1: really explain why Anteximotes and an Aximander, who would have
Speaker 1: had access to these same observations, would have concluded otherwise, though,
Speaker 1: or why we should conclude that Theales had different ideas
Speaker 1: on this idea than the two of them. Yeah, I've
Speaker 1: read this entry and I felt kind of convinced, and
Speaker 1: then I was like, wait, why am I convinced? Though
Speaker 1: I'm not, I still have questions. Also reportedly calculated the
Speaker 1: height of the Great Pyramids of Egypt using geometry by
Speaker 1: comparing the length of their shadow to the length of
Speaker 1: the shadow of his staff. He may have written a
Speaker 1: navigational work called the Nautical Star Guide, although Diogenes Leargists
Speaker 1: says this was by Phocos of Samos. Some accounts say
Speaker 1: Thales diverted the river hallis now known in Turkish as
Speaker 1: the Kazillermac River into a channel so that King Criesus
Speaker 1: could cross it with an army, and that he united
Speaker 1: the city states of Ionia in the face of aggression
Speaker 1: from the Kingdom of Lydia. We mentioned in our episode
Speaker 1: about Gerardis Mercader that Theal's is sometimes credited with making
Speaker 1: the first map projection. In this case, it was a
Speaker 1: star chart. Since making a map projection involves making a
Speaker 1: two dimensional map from a three dimensional globe, that's what
Speaker 1: it is. This means that he recognized that the visible
Speaker 1: night sky had a curved surface, even if he thought
Speaker 1: the earth below it was flat. Again seen two arguments
Speaker 1: on this that kind of contradicts the infinite sea concept. Well,
Speaker 1: if you sort of imagine, like, uh, one of those
Speaker 1: poppamatic bubbles where the flat part is the earth, and
Speaker 1: the domed part is the night sky, and then infinite
Speaker 1: sea all around it. Oh yeah, I guess sometimes. Daylees
Speaker 1: is described as bringing geometry to Greece from Egypt, and
Speaker 1: he's sometimes credited with several geometric theorems. Some of them
Speaker 1: include that a circle is bisected by its diameter, that
Speaker 1: if two sides of a triangle or of equal length,
Speaker 1: the angles opposite those sides are also equal, and that
Speaker 1: opposite angles formed by intersecting straight lines are also equal.
Speaker 1: Daylees is sometimes even credited with coming up with the
Speaker 1: entire idea of geometric proofs. There are also a couple
Speaker 1: of anecdotes about Daylies that paint almost contradictory pictures of
Speaker 1: him as a person. One as that once upon a
Speaker 1: time someone criticized him for not using his wisdom to
Speaker 1: get rich. So based on his observations of the heavens,
Speaker 1: he predicted that there was going to be a larger
Speaker 1: than normal olive crop that year, and he got control
Speaker 1: of all the olive presses in the area, so when
Speaker 1: that crop was harvested, everybody had to pay him to
Speaker 1: press their olives into oil. And then, having proved his
Speaker 1: point that he could get rich with his brain if
Speaker 1: he wanted to. He went back to his own work
Speaker 1: and left olive pressing behind. Aristotle is one of the
Speaker 1: sources for this story, but he doesn't actually seem to
Speaker 1: really believe it or think. He thinks that if it
Speaker 1: did happen, it wasn't something that Theales did. Among other things,
Speaker 1: even if the olive crop hadn't been particularly large, he
Speaker 1: still would have had a monopoly on all the presses.
Speaker 1: Theylies definitely didn't invent the idea of the monopoly. The
Speaker 1: other is his story reported by Plato, who said that
Speaker 1: one time Thales was so focused on studying the night
Speaker 1: sky that he fell into a well listen who among us?
Speaker 1: When a servant pulled him out, She made fun of him,
Speaker 1: asking rhetorically how he could hope to learn about the
Speaker 1: heavens when he could not even watch his feet. Yeah,
Speaker 1: according to the stories, he was both very astute and
Speaker 1: incredibly absent minded. Uh. This episode feels like it was
Speaker 1: already two thirds caveats, but we have still more caveats,
Speaker 1: Like we really don't have any way of knowing whether
Speaker 1: Thalies actually accomplished a lot of these things that were
Speaker 1: attributed to him. It's possible that since he was an
Speaker 1: early Greek philosopher who was reputed to be very wise,
Speaker 1: people just gave him credit for things that didn't have
Speaker 1: a clear origin point. It was not all that unusual
Speaker 1: to sort of attribute things to early Greek philosophers. Even
Speaker 1: the ancient Greek sources that comment on his life and
Speaker 1: work do not suggest that they had any first hand
Speaker 1: access to any of his writing to back any of
Speaker 1: this up. And there are so many sources today that
Speaker 1: describe Thales as the first Greek philosopher or the first
Speaker 1: scientist or first astronomer, and claim that ancient Greek scholars
Speaker 1: described him that way as well. But the idea that
Speaker 1: Thales established Greek philosophy and that Greek philosophy then formed
Speaker 1: the foundation for the entirety of Western thought really seems
Speaker 1: to have started to evolve in Europe around the eighteenth century.
Speaker 1: In writing that is threaded through with so much xenophobia
Speaker 1: and racism, it's likely that much of Thali's seemingly groundbreaking
Speaker 1: knowledge actually came from Egypt. Thales's eclipse prediction and the
Speaker 1: Battle of the Eclipse are intertwined. We are going to
Speaker 1: start with that battle after a sponsor break, and that
Speaker 1: is the part of the show that will have the
Speaker 1: horrific cannibalism in it. Our earliest source on the Battle
Speaker 1: of the Eclipse is by Herodotus, who lived from around
Speaker 1: for eighty four BCE to around four thirty BCE, so
Speaker 1: that was more than one hundred years after the death
Speaker 1: of Thales, in a century or so before this battle
Speaker 1: is believed to have happened. Here is what Herodotus had
Speaker 1: to say. Quote, there had a risen war between the
Speaker 1: Lydians and the Medis, lasting five years, in which years
Speaker 1: the Medis often discomfited the Lydians, and the Lydians often
Speaker 1: discomfited the Medis, and among others they fought also a
Speaker 1: battle by night, and as they still carried on the
Speaker 1: war with equally balanced fortune, in the sixth year a
Speaker 1: battle took place, in which it happened when the fight
Speaker 1: had begun, that suddenly the day became night. And this
Speaker 1: change of the day Theales the Milesian, had foretold to
Speaker 1: the Ionians, laying down as a limit this very year
Speaker 1: in which the change took place. The Lydians, however, and
Speaker 1: the Medis, when they saw that it had become night
Speaker 1: and said of day ceased from their fighting and were
Speaker 1: much more eager both of them that peace should be
Speaker 1: made between them. So to contextualize that a bit, Lydia
Speaker 1: occupied much of what is now western Turkia, and it
Speaker 1: was heavily influenced by neighboring Ionia, where Thales was from.
Speaker 1: The Medis were the people of Media, which occupied what's
Speaker 1: now northwestern Iran as well as parts of what's now
Speaker 1: Azerbaijan and Iraq. It's possible that there was a pretty
Speaker 1: mundane reason for this war. It had started when Aliades
Speaker 1: was king of Lydia and Sayagsaris was king of Media.
Speaker 1: Both were trying to expand their kingdoms and annexed the
Speaker 1: territory that lay between Lydia and Media, which brought the
Speaker 1: two kingdoms into conflict with each other. But sometimes Herodotus's
Speaker 1: histories included stories that were really compelling but not necessarily substantiated.
Speaker 1: We've mentioned that previously on the show, and we've talked
Speaker 1: about Herodotus and he offers a way more horrifying and
Speaker 1: gruesome explanation for this war that was connected to a
Speaker 1: group of Scythians. Scythians were a nomadic people who migrated
Speaker 1: from Central Asia to what's now Russia and Ukraine. Eventually
Speaker 1: their empire was centered on what's now Crimea. Their history
Speaker 1: can be tricky to put together because they didn't use writing,
Speaker 1: and a number of ancient sources that did write about
Speaker 1: them sometimes conflated them with other nomadic peoples who spoke
Speaker 1: Iranian languages. Also, a lot of these sources were describing
Speaker 1: a society that their own people or their allies had
Speaker 1: been attacked by, which of course influenced how they wrote
Speaker 1: about these other people. But the Scythians were known for
Speaker 1: their horsemanship, their archery, and their prowess in combat, very
Speaker 1: broadly speaking. When this war took place, the Scythians controlled
Speaker 1: territory to the northwest of Media and across the Black
Speaker 1: Sea from Lydia. But more than a century prior, the
Speaker 1: Scythians had controlled Media and the Medes had expelled the
Speaker 1: Scythian Empire from their territory sometime around six hundred BCE,
Speaker 1: but there were still small groups and bands in the
Speaker 1: area after this point. So according to Herodotus's history, there
Speaker 1: was a group of Scythians who were feuding with the
Speaker 1: rest of their people at first, Syaksaris offered them his protection,
Speaker 1: and he also sent some boys to the Cythians to
Speaker 1: be taught their language and to learn archery. But one
Speaker 1: day the Cythians went hunting, and they came back empty handed,
Speaker 1: and Sayaksari's quote dealt with them very harshly and used
Speaker 1: insult towards them. According to Herodotus, in response, the Scythians
Speaker 1: quote planned to kill and cut up one of the
Speaker 1: boys who were being instructed among them, and having dressed
Speaker 1: his flesh as they had been wont to dress the
Speaker 1: wild animals to you, bear it to siaks Aris and
Speaker 1: give it to him, pretending that it was game taken
Speaker 1: in hunting. There are also some later sources that suggest
Speaker 1: that this boy was one of Syaxari's's own children, or
Speaker 1: some other child who was part of the royal family.
Speaker 1: Once they had done this, the Scythians fled from media,
Speaker 1: and quote Sayasaris with the guests who ate at his
Speaker 1: table tasted of that meat, and the Scythians, having so done,
Speaker 1: became suppliants for the protection of Aliades. Sayasis demanded that
Speaker 1: Aliades return the Scythians to him so they could be
Speaker 1: brought to justice, and Aliades refused, and that started a war,
Speaker 1: one in which, according to what we read earlier, the
Speaker 1: two sides were pretty evenly matched for more than five years.
Speaker 1: Herodotus states that after this battle, in which the day
Speaker 1: turned into night and the two armies were inspired to
Speaker 1: lay down their arms, two men helped negotiate a peace.
Speaker 1: One was si Ansis of Cilia and one was Libidinous
Speaker 1: of Babylon. Other sources say that the Babylonian negotiator was
Speaker 1: actually King Nebuchinezer. The second this treaty involved a marriage
Speaker 1: between Aliats's daughter Arhinius and Sayaksaris's son Astyages. There are
Speaker 1: some other fragmented writings that suggest that maybe there was
Speaker 1: also a second marriage between a Median princess and either
Speaker 1: Aliates or Aliati's son Cretius. We have all whole episode
Speaker 1: on Cretius, and since this is the second time that
Speaker 1: he has come up, we will run that as a
Speaker 1: Saturday Classic sometime soon. It's probably not surprising based on
Speaker 1: how many caveats were involved in our discussion of Thales,
Speaker 1: but there are various conflicting accounts of this war. Besides
Speaker 1: the conflicting details that we've already mentioned and scholars have
Speaker 1: been trying to piece together all of these details for
Speaker 1: literally centuries. One question is whether Sayaksaris was king of
Speaker 1: Media for the entire content. The account of Herodotus suggests
Speaker 1: that he was, as does Clement of Alexandria, but Cicero
Speaker 1: and other sources say that Saya Czaris died at some
Speaker 1: point during the conflict or during the battle, and was
Speaker 1: succeeded by his son Astyages, who continued the war with
Speaker 1: the Lydians. Some translations of Herodotus interpret the treaty negotiations
Speaker 1: as happening under Astiagies and not Saya Csari's. There's also
Speaker 1: some debate about exactly where the border between these two
Speaker 1: kingdoms was set under this treaty. The Kazillarmac River is
Speaker 1: a logical and kind of widely assumed borderline, but it's
Speaker 1: not really spelled out specifically in the surviving accounts. But
Speaker 1: the last big question is when and where the battle happened,
Speaker 1: which is connected to when and where the eclipse happened,
Speaker 1: and that ties in to exactly what Theales predicted about
Speaker 1: the eclipse and how or whether he could have made
Speaker 1: such a prediction. And we're going to talk more about
Speaker 1: all of that after or a sponsor break. If you
Speaker 1: read about the battle of the eclipse in a newspaper
Speaker 1: or a magazine, maybe a website meant for a general
Speaker 1: audience today, maybe today specifically, because this is something that's
Speaker 1: gotten just a lot of attention in the run up
Speaker 1: to this today's eclipse, it'll probably say that this eclipse
Speaker 1: happened on May twenty eighth, five eighty five BCE. That's
Speaker 1: the date that I said up at the top of
Speaker 1: the show. And most of the time it comes across
Speaker 1: as like this is and always has been the definitive
Speaker 1: date that was established for the eclipse and consequently the battle.
Speaker 1: Some sources go so far as to say that because
Speaker 1: we know exactly when and where this eclipse occurred, we
Speaker 1: also know exactly when and where the battle happened, meaning
Speaker 1: it is one of the first events and where we
Speaker 1: can pinpoint the exact date, time and place. Naturally, it's
Speaker 1: way more complicated than that. The account of Herodotus doesn't
Speaker 1: really say that there was a solar eclipse. He said
Speaker 1: that day turned tonight. Most sources interpret that as being
Speaker 1: about a solar eclipse, and that's the most obvious possible explanation.
Speaker 1: This is especially true since Herodotus also put it in
Speaker 1: the context of a prediction, unless someone just makes a
Speaker 1: lucky guess. Successfully predicting an eclipse requires knowledge of math, geometry,
Speaker 1: and astronomy, and predicting where it will actually be visible
Speaker 1: also requires a knowledge of geography, so the ability to
Speaker 1: predict eclipse is also seen as an indication of where
Speaker 1: a society is. In terms of all of this needed knowledge,
Speaker 1: it would make sense for someone who had the reputed
Speaker 1: brilliance of Thales to be credited with this kind of prediction.
Speaker 1: At the same time, there are also Greek accounts of
Speaker 1: philosopher anex Agoris predicting a meteor strike that is not
Speaker 1: something you can predict in the same way that you
Speaker 1: would predict an eclipse. We've talked about EnEx Agris on
Speaker 1: the show before, but not about this whole meteor prediction.
Speaker 1: So it's like within the realm of possibility that Theyales
Speaker 1: predicted some other phenomenon that could turn day into night,
Speaker 1: one that wouldn't necessarily be predictable in the same way
Speaker 1: that an eclipse is. Some of the other possible explanations
Speaker 1: for the day turning intonight include more mundane things like
Speaker 1: a very sudden, dense cloud cover moving in, or things
Speaker 1: that are a lot more dramatic, like atmospheric debris from
Speaker 1: a volcanic eruption or smoke from a massive fire. Herodotus
Speaker 1: also didn't specify when exactly they Lees had predicted this
Speaker 1: eclipse would happen. According to the translation that Tracy used
Speaker 1: for this episode, Herodotus just said Theaylees had foretold it
Speaker 1: to the Ionians quote laying down as a limit this
Speaker 1: very year in which the change took place. Neither he
Speaker 1: nor later Greek writers specified which year they Lees had predicted,
Speaker 1: although some did correlate that prediction with a specific eclipse
Speaker 1: that by that point was known to have occurred sometime
Speaker 1: in the six or seventh century BCE. There are so
Speaker 1: many not entirely answered questions about all of this. First,
Speaker 1: if Theyales really did successfully predict a solar eclipse, meaning
Speaker 1: he did some kind of calculation rather than just making
Speaker 1: a lucky guess, how did he do it? One common
Speaker 1: idea is that he used something called the Babylonian saras,
Speaker 1: which is a cycle of two hundred and twenty three
Speaker 1: lunar months or eighteen years ten days and eight hours
Speaker 1: in which there is a repeating pattern of eclipses. This
Speaker 1: cycle does exist, but it's not entirely clear what the
Speaker 1: Babylonians knew about it. Lunar eclipses are visible only at night,
Speaker 1: and solar eclipses are very brief and are fully visible
Speaker 1: only in a narrow band that is not in the
Speaker 1: same place from one solar eclipse to the next, So
Speaker 1: it's possible that the Babylonians had enough records of lunar
Speaker 1: eclipses to spot a pattern among them, but this probably
Speaker 1: would not be true for solar eclipses. In nineteen fifty two,
Speaker 1: mathematician Otto Neugebauer argued that the idea that the Babylonians
Speaker 1: used the Sero cycle to predict eclipses came from an
Speaker 1: error made by Edmund Halley in the late seventeenth century
Speaker 1: and then picked up by basically everyone else who wrote
Speaker 1: about eclipses for the next three hundred years. I guess
Speaker 1: if you're going to pick up somebody's mistake and repeat
Speaker 1: it for Halle's a good one, why not start with
Speaker 1: Edmund Halley? Again? There is a real pattern there. It's
Speaker 1: pretty obvious using something like a color coded chart of
Speaker 1: all the various types of eclipses, and today we have
Speaker 1: things like measurements taken using reflectors that astronauts left on
Speaker 1: the Moon in order to allow us to like more
Speaker 1: specifically track and measure the movement of the Moon. We
Speaker 1: have way more precise data on this and what this
Speaker 1: pattern actually looks like. It is just not as clear
Speaker 1: how much the Babylonians understood about this and whether it
Speaker 1: could have been enough to allow Thales to use it
Speaker 1: to make a prediction about a solar eclipse. While there's
Speaker 1: various other speculation about methods Dalies may have used to
Speaker 1: predict the eclipse, it's possible that it was just a
Speaker 1: lucky guess, or it could be that the dramatic intersection
Speaker 1: between a battle and eclipse and the end of a
Speaker 1: six year war seemed like something someone as wise as
Speaker 1: Day's would have predicted. Some of the sources that were
Speaker 1: used in this episode conclude that there was no prediction
Speaker 1: and that this entire story is made up, or that
Speaker 1: the idea of day turning into night was actually more
Speaker 1: of a literary trope than an actual description of what
Speaker 1: was happening in the sky. There are even some arguments
Speaker 1: that the armies were so preoccupied with fighting that they
Speaker 1: fought into the night and then decided to lay down
Speaker 1: their arms when they realized what they had done. This
Speaker 1: last interpretation, though, doesn't work with translations that also say
Speaker 1: that night then turned back to day unless it all
Speaker 1: took a really long time. By the sixteenth century, mathematicians
Speaker 1: and astronomers knew a lot more about the solar system
Speaker 1: and mathematics, and were using the movement of the Earth
Speaker 1: and the Moon to more precisely calculate when previous eclipses
Speaker 1: had happened, and they started proposing eclipses that could have
Speaker 1: been the one connected to Thales, again based on more
Speaker 1: specific math rather than kind of guessing. Setus Calvisius put
Speaker 1: the year at six O seven. Isaac Newton said it
Speaker 1: was five eighty five BCE. Henry Usher said six zho
Speaker 1: one BCE. That is really just a sample. I don't
Speaker 1: think that's even half of the ones that were put forth.
Speaker 1: But these and other astronomers in the seventeenth and eighteenth
Speaker 1: centuries kind of narrowed it down to eclipses that had
Speaker 1: happened sometime between six twenty six BCE and five eighty
Speaker 1: five BCE. Astronomer Francis Bailey took up the question again
Speaker 1: in the nineteenth century and concluded that the Theailey's eclipse
Speaker 1: had taken place on September thirtieth, six ' ten BCE,
Speaker 1: because based on his calculations, that's the only one that
Speaker 1: would have reached totality and would have crossed what was
Speaker 1: then known as the River Hallas in the general area
Speaker 1: where the battle was believed to have taken place. By
Speaker 1: this point, so many people had tried to figure this out.
Speaker 1: In Bailey's words, quote, there is probably no fact in
Speaker 1: ancient history that has given rise to so many discussions
Speaker 1: and to such a variety of opinions as the solar eclipse, which,
Speaker 1: according to Herodotus, is said to have been predicted by Thales,
Speaker 1: in which, owing to a very singular coincidence, put an
Speaker 1: end to a furious war that raged between Sayaksari's King
Speaker 1: of Media and Aliaates, king of Lydia. Bailey wrote this
Speaker 1: in eighteen eleven, which was before even more work about
Speaker 1: it was published later in the nineteenth century, after astronomers
Speaker 1: started to realize that earlier calculations didn't account for small
Speaker 1: shifts in the moon's movement known as secular acceleration. These
Speaker 1: small shifts could have a big effect on exactly what
Speaker 1: a solar eclipse looked like from Earth, where it was visible,
Speaker 1: and where the path of totality was, and how the
Speaker 1: eclipse moved along that path. Other astronomers started proposing other
Speaker 1: eclipses as possibilities, including one on May eighteenth, six oh
Speaker 1: three BCE, and then one on May twenty eighth, five
Speaker 1: eighty five BCE, which seemed to be the general consensus
Speaker 1: for the so called right eclipse at this point. There
Speaker 1: are still arguments against the five eighty five BCE eclipse,
Speaker 1: though One major argument is when exactly the eclipse would
Speaker 1: have been total in the area where the battle probably
Speaker 1: took place. Totality of a solar eclipse does not last
Speaker 1: for very long. It's you know, very very roughly speaking,
Speaker 1: between two and four minutes. In this region, the eclipse
Speaker 1: would have started around five thirty PM, so just with
Speaker 1: the Sun starting to be covered. Totality would have started
Speaker 1: about an hour after that and lasted for a couple
Speaker 1: of minutes. Then the eclipse would have ended around seven
Speaker 1: twenty PM, with the Sun no longer blocked by any
Speaker 1: part of the moon. But then sunset would have started
Speaker 1: another ten or fifteen minutes after that. Most translations of
Speaker 1: Herodotus and other accounts described the day turning into night
Speaker 1: not long after the battle began, So one argument is
Speaker 1: that it would have been unusual for a battle to
Speaker 1: start so late in the day, although Herodotus did also
Speaker 1: note that these two armies fought at least one battle
Speaker 1: at night during this war. The other is that two
Speaker 1: armies in the middle of the battle probably would not
Speaker 1: have even noticed a solar eclipse that started that close
Speaker 1: to sunset, when the sky was already darkening. Okay, we'll
Speaker 1: talk about this more on Friday. But personally, having been
Speaker 1: in the path of totality in twenty seventeen, and also
Speaker 1: being a person who routinely hikes in like the thin,
Speaker 1: sad light of four pm in the winter in New England,
Speaker 1: I disagree with the idea that they would not have
Speaker 1: noticed an eclipse close to sunset. We'll talk again more
Speaker 1: about that on Friday. This examination of when Thailey's eclipse
Speaker 1: may have happened is It's not the only such effort
Speaker 1: to try to apply astronomy to history. There are a
Speaker 1: lot of references to eclipses in old historical documents or
Speaker 1: two astronomical events that might have been eclipses. So when
Speaker 1: Isaac Newton and others were trying to figure out the
Speaker 1: date when the eclipse of Thales happened, they were also
Speaker 1: doing similar work on other historical eclipses, and the focus
Speaker 1: of this research shifted over time. At first, the historical
Speaker 1: record was the starting point. What actual eclipse could this
Speaker 1: document be referring to? Astronomers and other researchers would look
Speaker 1: for an eclipse that exactly matched the account, But over
Speaker 1: time it became clear that historical accounts weren't always totally
Speaker 1: accurate when it came to astronomical phenomena. This was especially
Speaker 1: true in the works of people like Herodotus, who were
Speaker 1: often reading about things that happened more than a century earlier.
Speaker 1: Sometimes no specific year was mentioned, but sometimes when there
Speaker 1: was a year mentioned, it wasn't a year that had
Speaker 1: an eclipse at all. So the focus shifted a little
Speaker 1: bit from finding the eclipse that matched the written record
Speaker 1: to correcting the written record based on the only options
Speaker 1: for when the eclipse could have happened. So even though
Speaker 1: if you read this like one page article, that's many
Speaker 1: of them floating around about the battle of the eclipse
Speaker 1: the day. It'll probably make it sound like there was
Speaker 1: definitively or almost definitely an eclipse on May twenty eighth
Speaker 1: of five eighty five BCE, and that it definitely did
Speaker 1: interrupt a battle that day. There's still just a ton
Speaker 1: of debate around this. Based on what's become our typical schedule,
Speaker 1: this episode should hopefully be out before the eclipse starts
Speaker 1: in Mexico today and a couple of hours before it
Speaker 1: reaches the southwestern US. So if you are about to
Speaker 1: try to watch it, good luck and please protect your eyes.
Speaker 1: If you're in the Pacific and it's already passed you,
Speaker 1: I hope, we hope that you had clear skies and
Speaker 1: that you were able to get a glimpse. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: if you're not watching an eclipse to day, if it's
Speaker 1: three years from now or whatever, you know, if you've
Speaker 1: seen one before, I hope it was great. I have
Speaker 1: some listener mail from Kieran and Kieran's listener mail was
Speaker 1: titled Etiquette the Outbursts of Everett True, and Kieran wrote, Hi,
Speaker 1: Holly and Tracy, I just finished listening to the new
Speaker 1: episode on etiquette, and it immediately reminded me of this
Speaker 1: American comic that ran from nineteen oh five to nineteen
Speaker 1: twenty seven. I originally came across it on social media,
Speaker 1: and forgive me that I haven't researched it as thoroughly
Speaker 1: as I could have. I'm sure there are some things
Speaker 1: about it that have not aged well, but I was
Speaker 1: surprised at some of the comics being more progressive than
Speaker 1: I would have expected from a white comic creator during
Speaker 1: this time period. Unlike the etiquette books you covered in
Speaker 1: the episode, which emphasize being prem and proper, it takes
Speaker 1: on the rather different tone of an older, portly man
Speaker 1: pummeling people into good sense and manners. I especially enjoyed
Speaker 1: the ones where Everett true calls out someone racist, another
Speaker 1: of him correcting someone who was abusing a dog, as
Speaker 1: well as one as Everett being decided anti quote man
Speaker 1: spreading things we are still dealing with today. Obviously, I'm
Speaker 1: not advocating for violence, but bits of the comic did
Speaker 1: make me chuckle, and I hope it offers an interesting
Speaker 1: addition to your etiquette research. I'm attaching here the original
Speaker 1: post that caught my eye. Thanks so much, for that
Speaker 1: wonderful podcast and all that you do. All the best, Kieran.
Speaker 1: Kieran then sent another email shortly thereafter that said, PS,
Speaker 1: I forgot to add this to the original email, but
Speaker 1: I'm afraid I cannot pay the pet tax at the moment,
Speaker 1: as my precious for a baby of fourteen years passed
Speaker 1: away back in twenty twenty one and I haven't been
Speaker 1: ready for new for babies yet. But I do have
Speaker 1: some recently finished quilts and quilts and progress. I hope
Speaker 1: y'all are into some textile goodness. Thanks again, First, these
Speaker 1: quilt pictures are beautiful. What us send it? Textiles? What yuck?
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for sending these quilt pictures. They're
Speaker 1: so lovely beautiful. Yeah. So when I got this email,
Speaker 1: I was like, Everett True, all of this is ringing
Speaker 1: a bell to me. We have to have talked about
Speaker 1: this before. When was it? And the answer was it
Speaker 1: was during the episodes where we sort of talked about
Speaker 1: our prior episode on the nineteen eighteen flu pandemic in
Speaker 1: our new context of having lived through a year at
Speaker 1: that point of COVID nineteen pandemic. Because other things that
Speaker 1: Everett True beat people into a pulp about were refusing
Speaker 1: to wear a mask in places that masks are supposed
Speaker 1: to be worn and coughing without covering their mouth. So yes,
Speaker 1: Outburst of Ever it true. I similarly have no idea
Speaker 1: about like this comic beyond those kinds of things that
Speaker 1: we just talked about or the creator. But I did
Speaker 1: appreciate getting this email. If you would like to send
Speaker 1: us a note about this or any other podcast, we
Speaker 1: are at History podcast atiheartradio dot com. Our social media
Speaker 1: our username is typically missed in History. Email is the
Speaker 1: best way to get us. I will say, for the
Speaker 1: most part, I personally do not look at any of
Speaker 1: my social media mentions on any platform, so if you
Speaker 1: try to talk to me there, I'm probably not gonna
Speaker 1: see it. You can subscribe to our show on the
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