Life Story: Claudius Ptolemy was born in approx. 90 A.D. He is Greek-speaking and lived in a Hellenistic culture of Roman Egypt. None of his family records exist but probably born in Egypt. He was a geographer, astronomer, and astrologer.

www.livius.org

Contributions to Science:

~ Wrote the Almagest which used geometry to explain the motions and positions of the planets, sun, and moon against stars that didn’t move.

~ At first he believed the Earth was at the center of the universe but later he began to believe that earth and planets moved around larger objects

- He then coined the term: “Epicycle” which is used to describe the circular

~ He was the first to create horoscopes

~ He assigned coordinates to all the known places in the world in his book Geographia

~ He wrote Tetrabiblos which applied astronomy to astrology

~ He wrote Optics which described the properties of light

www.pbs.org

Quote by Ptolemy:

“I know that I am mortal by nature, and ephemeral; but when I trace at my pleasure the windings to and fro of the heavenly bodies I no longer touch the earth with my feet: I stand in the presence of Zeus himself and take my fill of ambrosia, food of the gods.”

Interesting Facts:

~ He found the positions of over a thousand stars

~ Claudius means “Roman Citizenship” and Ptolemaeus means “Resident of Egypt”

~ Ptolemy know that the Earth was a sphere, and his is the first known projection of this sphere onto a sheet of paper.

Information from this site was found at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ptolemy

http://webpages.charter.net/darksky25/quotes.html

http://obs.niniplanets.org/psc/theman.html