first point of Libra Quick reference
A Dictionary of Astronomy (3 ed.)
... point of Libra ( symbol ♎ ) The point on the celestial sphere diametrically opposite the first point of Aries . It is the same as the autumnal equinox. It has right ascension 12h and declination zero. It is the point at which the Sun passes from north to south of the celestial equator, which happens on September 22 or 23 each year. Because of precession , it no longer lies in Libra but in neighbouring...
first point of Libra
hed Reference library
The Oxford Companion to Chaucer
...) heed , heved , head . In A Treatise on the Astrolabe and Equatorie of the Planetis , the word denotes the first degree or beginning of the sign (L. caput Arietis , etc.) . It is used in practice of only four signs, but that is because they are of special importance. The four are Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn. The Sun's entering those signs marks the commencement of the four seasons, spring, summer, autumn, and winter. The head of Aries is the reference point from which longitudes are measured along the ecliptic . ( See also months and...
ecliptic Quick reference
The Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea (2 ed.)
...the Greek ekleipsis , disappearance, the apparent path of the sun among the stars which is a great circle inclined to the celestial equator at an angle of about 23° 27′. It is so named because, for an eclipse of the sun or moon to occur, the moon must lie on or near the ecliptic. It intersects the celestial equator, or equinoctial , twice during the year at the equinoxes; on 21 March at the ‘first point of Aries’, which is 0° Right Ascension, and on 23 September at the ‘first point of Libra’, at 180° Right Ascension, and is furthest from the equator...
equinox Quick reference
A Dictionary of Astronomy (3 ed.)
... Either of the two points at which the Sun’s apparent yearly path (the ecliptic) intersects the celestial equator; or the dates on which this occurs—on March 20 ( vernal equinox ) and September 22 or 23 ( autumnal equinox ). These points are also known as the first point of Aries and the first point of Libra . When the term ‘equinox’ is used without qualification, the vernal (spring) equinox is meant. Around the time of the equinoxes, night and day are equal in length the world over. The equinox is not a fixed point, but moves because of precession ...
right ascension Quick reference
A Dictionary of Weights, Measures, and Units
...the segment of the sky from 0 to 2 h (0 to 30°), Taurus from 2 to 4 h (30 to 60°), et seq. through Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, and Aquarius to Pisces at 22 to 24 h (330 to 360°). Greenwich Hour Angle ( GHA ) is a similar concept to right ascension, being the west longitude (0° to 360°) of the point directly below the celestial body at any instant. Since the GHA of any body equals the GHA of the First Point of Aries plus (360° minus RA of the body), the latter referred to as the Sidereal Hour Angle ( SHA ) of the body,...
zodiac Quick reference
A Dictionary of Weights, Measures, and Units
...band of our sky within which the Sun and its other planets appear to travel, divided traditionally into twelve equal-sized segments named sequentially Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces. However, while each of these is classically the name of a specific star pattern, still used, along with 76 outside this band, as one of the variously sized polygons (‘constellations’) into which the heavens are fixedly divided, they have a distinct meaning for the zodiac. The apparent annular path of the Sun...
Livy Quick reference
The Oxford Dictionary of the Classical World
...books, and it is just there that we find the greatest concentration of non‐Ciceronian usages, e.g. in the story of the Bacchanalia in book 39 or the account of the death of Cicero preserved by Seneca the Younger . Livy was a patriotic writer, though in narrative he never refers to Roman troops as ‘our men’, ‘our army’, and often, writing from their opponents' point of view, talks of the Romans as ‘enemy’. His aim was to chronicle the rise of Rome to mastery first of Italy, then of the rest of the Mediterranean world, and to highlight the virtues which...
algebra Reference library
The Oxford Dictionary of the Renaissance
...‘radix’, first appear in the work of Michael Stiefel ( 1544 ). The equals sign (=), apparently derived from the symbol for the zodiac sign Libra (the Balance), first appears in the work of Robert Recorde . However, algebra books, being written in the vernacular, had only local circulation, so such symbols were not adopted either universally or rapidly. Viète was the first to use notation to distinguish between the unknown and given quantities: he used vowels for the former and consonants for the latter; Descartes ( 1637 ) introduced the use of letters from...
astrology Reference library
The Oxford Companion to the Mind (2 ed.)
...had allowed himself too much leeway of interpretation. Gauquelin's book, Songes et mensonges de l'astrologie ( 1969 ), was a scathing attack on astrology, as its title (Dreams and Delusions of Astrology) indicates. Yet the unsatisfactoriness of Krafft's experimental method led Gauquelin to devise a few simple tests of his own. He concentrated his analysis on two straightforward questions. The first was whether astrologers are correct in stating that people born under ‘odd’ signs of the zodiac—Aries, Gemini, Leo, Libra, Sagittarius, Aquarius—tend to be...
astrology Reference library
Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages
...world, in the field of the interpretation of major natural, political or religious events: hypothetical tempests of 1186 , linked to the presence of all the planets in the sign of Libra; Black Death of 1348 and Great Schism of 1378 , interpreted after the event as the consequences of the conjuctions of 1345 and 1365 , etc. As for comets, they usually foretold catastrophes, notably the coming death of some king or prince, and had done so since the early Middle Ages. Medieval astrology was thus never reduced to a set of techniques of prediction. It was...
Macedo, Francisco (1596–1681) Reference library
Emanuele Colombo
The Oxford Guide to the Historical Reception of Augustine
...a single point of view: that of Aug., to which scholastic theology ought to return. Evaluation In response to the accusation of Jansenism, brought against him by contemporary adversaries, M. replied that he had developed his interpretation of Aug.'s teachings long before reading the Augustinus . The presence of some agreements between the most radical forms of ...
Sundials Reference library
Atilla Bir and Mustafa Kaçar
The Oxford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Science, and Technology in Islam
...The stick shadow falls in this limited area, which is cast in two parts by the 21 March Aries and 23 June Libra equinox line. The stick shadow falls in winter on the upper part and in summer on the lower part of this line. One reading on the noon line’s upper end is given in the numerical mnemonic formula 7:31, then the numerals 7, 6, 5, and on the lower end again in numerical mnemonic letters as the time 4:29. Due to the position, these are the noon times on which the wall becomes illuminated during the afternoon by the shining sunlight. Thus the summer-winter...
money and coinage Reference library
The Oxford Dictionary of the Middle Ages
...At a value of about one day’s unskilled labour, the penny could support all but the smallest retail exchanges. Sales of land and other large transactions would have involved relatively large numbers of coins, but do not appear to have been prohibitively cumbersome. The coins were accounted in a system introduced by Charlemagne, in which 12 pennies were called by the old coin name ‘solidus’ ( shilling , sou , soldo ) and 240 pennies were given the name of the weight unit libra (pound, livre , libbra) . These terms were just units of account; only the...
Laon Reference library
The Grove Encyclopedia of Medieval Art and Architecture
...limited support of the bishop, the king, and the town. Documentary evidence provides only general indications for the dates of construction. The cathedral was begun shortly before or during the episcopacy of Gautier de Mortagne ( 1155–74 ), who bequeathed 100 libras for the building project, noting that he had annually given 20 libras since the beginning of construction. Funds were being raised in 1159 when the canons instituted an annual service to honour contributors to the building. In 1178 and 1180 two houses on the square in front of the church were...
Anglicanism Reference library
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Reformation
...of the formation of Anglicanism in the sixteenth century. Neill, Stephen . Anglicanism . 3d rev. ed. London, 1977. Most widely read modern study of the subject. First six chapters present historical review through the seventeenth century. Sykes, Stephen W. The Integrity of Anglicanism . London, 1978. This book marks a turning point in the discussion of Anglicanism. Most important. Wolf, William J. Anglican Spirituality . Wilton, Conn., 1982. Essays, mostly historical, by various scholars on a subject of growing importance in the discussion of...
Literature Reference library
Everett Emerson, Gary Ashwill, Gordon Hutner, and Thomas H. Schaub
The Oxford Companion to United States History
...Nest ( 1962 ); Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49 ( 1966 ); Diane Johnson's The Shadow Knows ( 1974 ); and Don DeLillo's White Noise ( 1985 ), The Names ( 1989 ), and Libra ( 1991 ). The satiric and revisionary impulse extended to the literary medium itself in the novels of Donald Barthelme , John Barth , William Gass , and Robert Coover ; and to historical fiction in Pynchon's V. ( 1963 ) and Gravity's Rainbow ( 1973 ), Styron's Confessions of Nat Turner ( 1967 ), E.L. Doctorow's Book of Daniel ( 1971 ), and Robert Coover's The...
Literature Reference library
Everett Emerson, Gary Ashwill, Gordon Hutner, Thomas H. Schaub, and Erin A. Smith
The Oxford Encyclopedia of American Cultural and Intellectual History
...of Lot 49 ( 1966 ); Diane Johnson's The Shadow Knows ( 1974 ); and Don DeLillo's White Noise ( 1985 ), The Names ( 1989 ), and Libra ( 1991 ). The satiric and revisionary impulse extended to the literary medium itself in the novels of Donald Barthelme, John Barth, William Gass, and Robert Coover; to historical fiction in Pynchon's V. ( 1963 ) and Gravity's Rainbow ( 1973 ), Styron's Confessions of Nat Turner ( 1967 ), E. L. Doctorow's Book of Daniel ( 1971 ), and Robert Coover's The Public Burning ( 1977 ); and to the New Journalism of...
science in history Reference library
Science, Technology, and Society
...México published Libra astronómica y filosófica , considered one of the most important works of Latin American science, in which he refuted prevailing astrological arguments about comets. In Brazil the same tone of reflections can be found in the works of Valentin Stancel, a Jesuit mathematician from Prague who lived in Brazil from 1663 until his death in 1705 . In the Viceroyalty of Peru, the first to be recognized as a mathematician is Francisco Ruiz Lozano ( 1607–1677 ), who wrote Tratado de los cometas , essentially a treatise of medieval...
Metals Reference library
The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East
...Cast ingots of gold, silver, iron, or copper further represent a type of metal artifact. They were traded extensively throughout the ancient Near East and provided the metalworker with the core material from which to manufacture objects. A Roman cast-gold bar with Latin stamps originates from Abukir (Egypt). Persian-period bronze, cube-shaped, as well as zoomorphic weights (e.g., ram, donkey, calf) are known from Ashkelon (Israel). Weights from the Roman East include a rectangular example with beveled edges used with a scalepan balance (Lat., libra ) and a...
