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Updated: May 1, 2025
"It does me honor, my learned friend; by all the gods it does me honor," replied Verus. "And in fact it is possible, it might very will be Will you do me the favor to come with me to that bust of Hipparchus? By the aid of that science which owes so much to him you may be able to render me an important service."
"The gods have blessed Clinias with abundant wealth," said Eudora; "Did he offer nothing to save the innocent?" "Dear lady," replied Milza, "Alcibiades demands such an immense sum for the ivory, that he says he might as well undertake to build the wall of Hipparchus, as to pay it. But I have not told you the most cruel part of the story.
Although he did not contribute directly to the mathematical proofs of Newton's theory, yet his name is closely associated with some of its greatest successes. He was the first to detect the acceleration of the moon's mean motion. Hipparchus, having compared his own observations with those of more ancient astronomers, supplied an accurate value of the moon's mean motion in his time.
Bent against the elder tyrant, perhaps from nobler motives than those which urged them against Hipparchus , each armed with a dagger concealed in the sacred myrtle bough which was borne by those who joined the procession, the conspirators advanced to the spot in the suburbs where Hippias was directing the order of the ceremonial.
It is supposed that he quitted his native place in consequence of some ill treatment which he had received from his fellow citizens: at least we are informed by Aurelius Victor, that the emperor Marcus Aurelius obliged the inhabitants of Nice to send yearly to Rome a certain quantity of corn, for having beaten one of their citizens, by name Hipparchus, a man of great learning and extraordinary accomplishments.
Laplace found that it amounts to somewhat less than half a second in a century. Consequently, the length of the tropical year is now about ten seconds less than it was in the time of Hipparchus. Limits of variation of the tropical year modified by the disturbing action of the sun and moon upon the terrestrial spheroid. The tropical year will not continue indefinitely to diminish in length.
This thought dominated the mind of Hipparchus, and so when his careful measurements led him to the discovery that the northward and southward journeyings of the sun did not divide the year into four equal parts, there was nothing open to him but to either assume that the earth does not lie precisely at the centre of the sun's circular orbit or to find some alternative hypothesis.
He was essentially an observer, but in this regard he won a secure place in the very first rank. Indeed, he was easily the greatest observing astronomer since Hipparchus, between whom and himself there were many points of resemblance. Hipparchus, it will be recalled, rejected the Aristarchian conception of the universe just as Tycho rejected the conception of Copernicus.
In connection with Hipparchus' great discovery it may be mentioned that modern astronomers have often attempted to fix dates in history by the effects of precession of the equinoxes. At about the date when the Great Pyramid may have been built gamma Draconis was near to the pole, and must have been used as the pole-star.
Both were from time to time powerfully stimulated by the appearance of startling novelties in a region described by philosophers as "incorruptible," or exempt from change. The catalogue of Hipparchus probably, and certainly that of Tycho Brahe, some seventeen centuries later, owed each its origin to the temporary blaze of a new star.
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