History of Dots Series: Missing the Beginning of the Stars as Dots

JF Ptak Science Books     Post 1029

[History of Dots series]

I was wondering when it was that stars began to appear as dots in celestial atlases or astronomical works–dots rather than starry stars, decorated spheres with crusty circular fire rings about them.
I felt that at some near point in the history of astronomy that t he conventional antiquarian way of representing a star would fall away with magnification, or clarity, just as has been the opposite case with the magnification of simple dots to reveal complex structures, say with the amplification of the flea eye...even a graphite pencil’s period at the end of a sentence on a piece of paper will turn itself from a dot into something as complex as the coastline of England (given enough magnification).
The first star atlas published in 1482 after the work of the first century astronomer and philosopher Hyginius¹ contains maps of the constellations composed of such beautiful light-encrusted bits.  There wouldn’t be another work like this one, strangely, for another 75  years. Alessandro Piccolomini’s² work of 1559 (which would be the first true star atlas), and again we see the familiar representation.  I thought that this would change with the invention of the telescope, so I checked out Galileo’s³ beautiful account (pictured at left) of his discoveries in the Sidereus–again the same complicated, sawblade stars. 

This has not been a very scientific search thus far, only checking handy notes and images that I’ve made.  But the same result has been true for the star images in Bayer⁴, Cellarius⁵, Hevelius⁶(at right), Coronelli⁷, Flamseed⁸,  Doppelmay^r9 and Bode¹⁰. Even William Herschel’s fabulous map of the galaxy is a collection of these pointed stars.  I think that I’ve just missed what is normally seen by regular folks as a conventional reassignment of star images to something more “modern”–and if that’s the case it has simply passed me by. (It seems though that among all of these that Hevelius comes closest--he inverts the familiar star pattern to the interior of a sphere.)  And I continue to miss it.  I’ve worked my incomplete survey now pretty close to the end of the 18th century, and I simply do not have a close answer..If anyone out there does have it, please let me know.  
Notes:
1. Hyginius Mythographus (fl. 1st century A.D.). Poeticon astronomicon. Edited by Jacobus Sentinus and Johannes Lucilius Santritter. Venice: Erhard Ratdolt, 14th October 1482. The first star atlas per se, standing alone in its field for a century.
2. Piccolomini, Alessandro.  De la Sfera del Mondo.  1559                               
3.  Galilei, Galilei  Sidereus Nuncius (known in English as Starry Messenger), published 1610
4.  Bayer, Johann.  (1572 – March 7, 1625) Uranometria 1603, which was the first atlas to cover the entire celestial sphere.
5. Cellarius, Andreas  (c. 1596 – 1665): Harmonia Macrocosmica (1660, 1661, 1708).
6. Hevelius, Johannes (1611 – 1687): Firmamentum Sobiescianum, sive Uranographia (1690).
7. Coronelli, Vincenzo (1650 – 1718):
8. Flamsteed, John (1646 – 1719): Atlas Coelestis (1729, 1753).
9. Doppelmayr, John Gabriel (1677 – 1750): Atlas Coelestis (1742).
10. Bode, Johann Elert (1747 – 1826): Vorstellung der Gestirne auf XXXIV Tafeln (1782).

Comments

[Anitanh.blogspot.com]

I just discovered your blog. Your "History of Dots" series is wonderful. My collage art is frequently designed with dots so I have particular interest here and I am sure I will enjoy exploring the rest of Ptak Science Books!

[John F. Ptak]

Thanks, Anita, thanks for your kind words. I looked at your blog and found your art very interesting, esp the designs using the Descartes images of how the brain sees! Very good! Now in particular to the first lovely image that you posted I direct your attention to the weird and fabulous Emily Vanderpoel, just in case you've not heard of her before. She's ultra-ephemeral but, well, you'll see.. http://longstreet.typepad.com/thesciencebookstore/2008/04/shaping-space-a.html

[Anitanh.blogspot.com]

What a marvelous book! I often design around a grid. Just the act of laying one down gets me over that blank canvas phobia.

And I love the color theory models. I just met Ogden Rood earlier today while tracking down the International Scientific Series.

[John F. Ptak]

Ogden Rood (an American w/very long history at Columbia in physics) was a significant guy, esp with the Chromatics book, no doubt read by Seurat. Here Rood talks about the stuff of pointilism on page 252:
From the foregoing, then, it is evident in general that the effect of contrast may be helpful or harmful to colours : by it they may be made to look more beautiful and precious, or they may damage each other, and then appear dull, pale, or even dirty. When the apparent saturation is increased, we have the first effect; the second, when it is diminished. Our diagram, Fig. 119, shows that the saturation is diminished when the contrasting colours are situated near each other in the chromatic circle, and increased when the reverse is true. It might be supposed that we could easily overcome the damaging effects of harmful contrast by simply making the colours themselves from the start somewhat more brilliant; this, however, is far from being true. The pleasure due to helpful contrast is not merely owing to the fact that the colours appear brilliant or saturated, but that they have been so disposed, and provided with such companions, that they are made to glow with more than their natural brilliancy. Then they strike us as precious and delicious, and this is true even when the actual tints are such as we would call poor or dull in isolation. From this it follows that paintings, made up almost entirely of tints that by themselves seem modest and far from brilliant, often strike us as being rich and gorgeous in colour ; while, on the other hand, the most gaudy colours can easily be arranged so as to produce a depressing effect on the beholder. We shall see hereafter that, in making chromatic compositions for decorative purposes or for paintings, artists of all times have necessarily been controlled to a considerable extent by the laws of contrast, which they have instinctively obeyed, just as children in walking and leaping respect the law of gravitation, though unconscious of its existence...