Mapping The Stars On The Revolving Spher

TC 2022; 14(1): 139–167
Martina Savio*
Mapping the stars on the revolving sphere
and reckoning time: star catalogues,
astronomical popularization, and practical
functions
https://doi.org/10.1515/tc-2022-0006
Abstract: Among the astronomical texts devoted (in various ways) to the descrip-
tion/explanation of the stars and their phenomena, the sources allow us to iden-
tify a somehow ‘specific textual current’ that consists in those texts which were
variously used or conceived as tools to convey knowledge of the ‘star map’ to a
non-specialist public, even if they are different from each other in terms of struc-
ture and ‘technical-scientific’ level (especially in relation to the presence or not
of the specific coordinates of the stars). The success of these texts over the course
of the tradition is one of the main signs that suggest the diffusion of this subject
matter in non-specialist contexts. According to the sources, the practical-applied
benefit of such knowledge, above all in terms of ‘time reckoning’, seems to be at
least one of the – certainly multiple and varied – reasons for this diffusion, and
perhaps not the least significant one.
Keywords: Star ‘catalogues’, astronomical popularization, time reckoning.
The treatment of the constellations is the main or sole subject of all those astro-
nomical texts (composed from the late classical/early Hellenistic era to the impe-
rial period) for which the transmission permits us to identify forms of use of a
‘didactic-popularizing’ type, i. e. those with the goal of teaching basic astronomi-
cal notions to a non-specialist public. These include, of course, the Phaenomena
of Aratus and a significant part of its large exegetical tradition, above all the Com
mentary on the Phaenomena of Eudoxus and Aratus by Hipparchus; the tradition
of catasterism writing; the elementary astronomical manual by Geminus (Intro
duction to the Phenomena); and the treatise on spherics dedicated to the exposi-
tion (in strictly geometric-kinematic terms) of the annual cycles of visibility of the
*Corresponding author: Martina Savio, Università di Genova, Genova, Italia,

E-Mail: saviomartina27@gmail.com
English translation by Orla Mulholland.

140 Martina Savio
fixed stars (heliacal risings and settings: cf. below), namely the Περὶ ἐπιτολῶν καὶ
δύσεων of Autolycus of Pitane (the diffusion/transmission and survival of which
are certainly linked to its use as an elementary didactic tool).1 Alongside this
‘original’ output in Greek, also at least worth mention is the complex of texts in
Latin resulting from the translations, reworkings, or at least partial restatements
of these Greek texts, accomplished in different historical and cultural phases and
contexts.2
The tradition of these texts is complex and problematic in various ways. They
have raised, and continue to raise, many questions, including on the function
for which they were designed, the sources used in them, their mutual interrela-
tions, and, in some cases, their original form, which was certainly different from
the one they have assumed in the surviving witnesses. Yet one of the few ele-
memts that the complex of information provided by the tradition permits us to
reconstruct with certainty is precisely the fact that they were widely regarded and
employed as didactic-popularizing tools for astronomical ideas among a non-spe-
cialist public – as was the case with Aratus’ Phaenomena and the Catasterisms –
and in some cases they were not just used in this way but were also originally
conceived as such by their own authors. This certainly applies to a part of the
exegetical tradition to the text of Aratus, which encompasses the Commentary of
Hipparchus,3 and to the manual of Geminus.4
Leaving aside the literary spirit and artistic and cultural intentions, in a
broader sense, that animated the composition of Aratus’ poem,5 and taking as
given the fact that it was undoubtedly studied and appreciated also in its purely
1 Cf. e. g. Repellini 1993, 326–327; Evans/Berggren 2006, 7; for the history of the transmission of
the text of Autolycus see in particular the edition of Aujac 1979 and the studies cited there.
2 From the late Republican period to the end of Late Antiquity and then to the high Middle Ages.
As well as the rich tradition connected to the text of Aratus and its exegesis, one should also con-
sider at least book IX (1–5) of the De Architectura of Vitruvius and books II–III of the Astronomy
of Hyginus. For a brief survey of the rich Aratean tradition in Latin see Lewis 1992, 95–97 and Pel-
lacani 2015, 5–6 n. 3–5, with the bibliography cited there; for the scholia to the Latin translation
by Germanicus see the editions Dell’Era 1979a; Dell’Era 1979b; for the so-called Aratus Latinus
and its tradition see in particular Le Bourdellès 1985.
3 Ed. Manitius 1894; Schironi forthcoming 2023. On the didactic purpose of Hipparchus’ Com
mentary see in particular Lightfoot 2017.
4 Ed. Aujac 1975. On the didactic-popularizing nature of the work of Geminus cf. e. g. Gem. 5.12–
15, and passim; Aujac 1975, lxxxviii–xc, passim; Evans/Berggren 2006, xvi–xvii, 2–15, passim.
5 This is certainly a complex question that is quite hard to reduce to schematic or unambiguous
interpretations, and so will probably inevitably remain open; for some of the hypotheses that
have been offered to date cf. Martin 1998, xlix–lxxxv (and the earlier studies discussed by him);
Netz 2009, 182–188; Sider 2014, 22–24.
Mapping the stars on the revolving sphere and reckoning time 141
poetic-literary dimension,6 the sources nonetheless clearly document that the

poem was widely used as a didactic tool for learning fundamental astronomical
notions already from at least the second century B.C.
The earliest and most significant testimony to this is provided by the writing
of Hipparchus, the earliest ‘authored commentary’ on Aratus known from the
direct tradition. This commentary – or, better, correction – of Aratus’ poem has
the explicit aim of updating/correcting or superseding the astronomical notions
reported by Aratus,7 which, according to Hipparchus, the poet had derived
from the writings of Eudoxus by transposing what the latter had treated in prose
into the poetic code of epic verse.8 Hipparchus attests that the text of Aratus
was normally regarded as a source of instruction in astronomy, indeed as a ref-
erence authority, in virtue of the prestige and persuasive power traditionally
ascribed to the poetic medium; this prestige was thus conferred also on content
that might be scientifically incorrect and/or out of date and which, according to
Hipparchus, had not been identified or marked as such by the commentators.9
6 Cf. e. g. Lewis 1992, in particular 110–117, for more recent surveys on the reception of Aratus
cf. Schironi forthcoming, and the papers presented at the online workshop “Aratus and Aratean
reception” (held on Friday 10th and Saturday 11th December 2021), organized by J. Lightfoot. For
discussion of some significant examples of the more strictly poetic-artistic dimension of men-
tioning and/or describing the stars in the ancient poetic tradition cf. Guidetti 2017.
7 Cf. Hipp. passim, in particular 1.1; Repellini 1993, 324–329; Kidd 1997, 18–21, 45; Netz 2009,
168–171; Tueller/Macfarlane 2009; Bishop 2016; Lightfoot 2017; Mastorakou 2020, 387–391; Schi-
roni forthcoming 2023.
8 Cf. Hipp. 1.1–3: (Ἄρατος) τῇ γὰρ Εὐδόξου συντάξει κατακολουθήσας τὰ Φαινόμενα γέγραφεν,
ἀλλ’οὐ κατ’ἰδίαν παρατηρήσας ἢ μαθηματικὴν κρίσιν ἐπαγγελλόμενος ἐν τοῖς οὐρανίοις
προφέρεσθαι καὶ διαμαρτάνων [τῶν] ἐν αὐτοῖς. (…) ὅτι μὲν οὖν τῇ Εὐδόξου περὶ τῶν φαινομένων
ἀναγραφῇ κατηκολούθηκεν ὁ Ἄρατος, μάθοι μὲν ἄν τις διὰ πλειόνων παρατιθεὶς τοῖς ποιήμασιν
αὐτοῦ περὶ ἑκάστου τῶν λεγομένων τὰς παρὰ τῷ Εὐδόξῳ λέξεις. (…) τὰ ὑπὸ τοῦ Ἀράτου καὶ
Εὐδόξου κοινῶς λεγόμενα; and passim; Dicks 1970, 153–157; Kidd 1997, 18–21, 45; Jones 2003,
332–333; Sider 2014, 22–24; Bishop 2016, 379–385, 392–394; Lightfoot 2017, 952–953.
9 See Hipp. 1.1 and passim, and in particular 1.1.5–6: θεωρῶν δ’οὖν <ἐν> τοῖς πλείστοις καὶ
χρησιμωτάτοις διαφωνοῦντα τὸν Ἄρατον πρὸς τὰ φαινόμενά τε καὶ γινόμενα κατὰ ἀλήθειαν,
τούτοις δ’ἅπασι σχεδὸν οὐ μόνον τοὺς ἄλλους, ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸν Ἄτταλον συνεπιγραφόμενον (…).
ὅπερ εὐλόγως πολλοὶ πεπόνθασιν· ἡ γὰρ τῶν ποιημάτων χάρις ἀξιοπιστίαν τινὰ τοῖς λεγομένοις
περιτίθησι, καὶ πάντες σχεδὸν οἱ τὸν ποιητὴν τοῦτον ἐξηγούμενοι προστίθενται τοῖς ὑπ’αὐτοῦ
λεγομένοις. Differently from what has been hypothesized by Tueller/Macfarlane 2009 as an over-
all key to reading the work of Hipparchus, the scientific failings of Aratus’ poem as object of Hip-
parchus’ correction are not attributed (neither primarily nor essentially) to its use of the medium
of poetry in itself. Indeed Hipparchus (1.1–3 and passim) insists a number of times on the fact that
the scientific errors that he means to correct concern exclusively the level of content and derive
(overwhelmingly) from repeating the same errors already present in the scientific prose work of
Eudoxus (whom Aratus is said to have ‘merely’ repeated: see previous note). Hipparchus stresses
142 Martina Savio
On the latter, Hipparchus makes specific reference to the abundance of commen-

taries on Aratus’ poem that were already in circulation in his time (mid-second
century B.C.).10 The one that he addressed in detail, namely the commentary of
the astronomer Attalus (a contemporary of Hipparchus), was likewise centred on
discussion of the astronomical correctness of the content of the poem.11
Most importantly, Hipparchus explicitly links the motivation of his own work
to the fame of the poem and its widespread use by non-specialists as a way to learn
astronomy: the declared purpose of Hipparchus’ work is to provide new instruc-
tion that is scientifically more correct – and also useful on a ‘practical’ level (see
below) – for the same audience of neophytes “keen to learn” (φιλομαθοῦντες)
who would normally turn to and rely on Aratus and the previous commentaries
on him for their own astronomical instruction, producing a sort of update both to
Aratus’ text and to its commentators.12
the expressive clarity and linearity of the poet’s style, understanding which did not, according to
him, pose specific difficulties (cf. e. g. Hipp. 1.1.4: ἁπλοῦς τε γὰρ καὶ σύντομός ἐστι ποιητής, ἔτι δὲ
σαφὴς τοῖς καὶ μετρίως παρηκολουθηκόσι), as has been noted also by Tueller/Macfarlane 2009,
245. He also regards poetry as having a distinctive communicative ‘power’: its “aesthetic pleas-
antness” (χάρις) enhances the authority and credibility of the content transmitted by means of
it. See in particular Lightfoot 2017 for an accurate survey of “the complex interplay between the
interconnected nexus of poetry, science, and scholarship throughout the Commentary” (Light-
foot 2017, 967).
10 See Hipp. 1.1.3–4: ἐξήγησιν μὲν οὖν τῶν Ἀράτου Φαινομένων καὶ ἄλλοι πλείονες συντετάχασιν·
ἐπιμελέστατα δὲ δοκεῖ πάντων Ἄτταλος ὁ καθ’ἡμᾶς μαθηματικὸς τὸν περὶ αὐτῶν πεποιῆσθαι
λόγον.
11 See Hipp. passim; e. g. previous note and 1.3.2–3: Ἄτταλος (…) λέγει γοῦν ἐν τῷ προοιμίῳ τὸν
τρόπον τοῦτον· “διὸ δὴ τό τε τοῦ Ἀράτου βιβλίον ἐξαπεστάλκαμέν σοι διωρθωμένον ὑφ’ἡμῶν
καὶ τὴν ἐξήγησιν αὐτοῦ, τοῖς τε φαινομένοις ἕκαστα σύμφωνα ποιήσαντες” (…) καὶ πάλιν ἑξῆς
φησι· “τάχα δέ τινες ἐπιζητήσουσι, τίνι λόγῳ πεισθέντες φαμὲν ἀκολούθως τῇ τοῦ ποιητοῦ
προαιρέσει τὴν διόρθωσιν τοῦ βιβλίου πεποιῆσθαι· ἡμεῖς δὲ ἀναγκαιοτάτην αἰτίαν ἀποδίδομεν
τὴν τοῦ ποιητοῦ πρὸς τὰ φαινόμενα συμφωνίαν”. On Hipparchus’ testimonies to the commen-
tary of Attalus and its astronomical focus cf. also e. g. Kidd 1997, 18; Tueller/Macfarlane 2009,
238–245; Lightfoot 2017, esp. 957–964.
12 See Hipp. 1.1.4–6: (…) τὸ δὲ συνεῖναι τὰ λεγόμενα περὶ τῶν οὐρανίων ὑπ’αὐτοῦ, τίνα τε
συμφώνως τοῖς φαινομένοις ἀναγέγραπται καὶ τίνα διημαρτημένως, τοῦτ’ὠφελιμώτατον
ἡγήσαιτ’ἄν τις καὶ μαθηματικῆς ἴδιον ἐμπειρίας. θεωρῶν δ’οὖν <ἐν> τοῖς πλείστοις καὶ
χρησιμωτάτοις διαφωνοῦντα τὸν Ἄρατον πρὸς τὰ φαινόμενά τε καὶ γινόμενα κατὰ ἀλήθειαν,
τούτοις δ’ἅπασι σχεδὸν οὐ μόνον τοὺς ἄλλους, ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸν Ἄτταλον συνεπιγραφόμενον, ἔκρινα
τῆς σῆς ἕνεκα φιλομαθίας καὶ τῆς κοινῆς τῶν ἄλλων ὠφελείας ἀναγράψαι τὰ δοκοῦντά μοι
διημαρτῆσθαι. (…) ἕνεκα τοῦ μήτε σὲ μήτε τοὺς λοιποὺς τῶν φιλομαθούντων ἀποπλανᾶσθαι τῆς
περὶ τὰ φαινόμενα κατὰ τὸν κόσμον θεωρίας. ὅπερ εὐλόγως πολλοὶ πεπόνθασιν (…); and passim;
cf. Lightfoot 2017.
The widespread use of the text of Aratus as an ‘elementary astronomical

manual’, or at least as a very (perhaps the most) popular source for non-special-
ists to learn astronomy, is demonstrated also by the use of the Phaenomena as a
source, debated and supplemented to various degrees, in other texts that are typ-
ically didactic and astronomical in character, such as the manual of Geminus.13
More generally the character of the transmission of Aratus’ poem,14 both in
the papyrus witnesses and in medieval manuscripts, provides clear indications
of forms of use that are linked to study and ‘instruction’ at various levels. Around
half of the papyri offer marginal (or interlinear) annotations of various length, in
addition to which the sole surviving fragment of exegesis of Aratus that securely
belongs to the category of “commentary”, the ὑπόμνημα, P.Oxy. 64 4426,15 and
the fragment of a glossary in P.Köln 10 40016 are to be taken into account. The rich
exegetical tradition of the Phaenomena had certainly begun to take shape and
become stratified already in the Hellenistic age and is well attested by the sources
from Hipparchus onward. The papyrus sources are not numerous, yet they yield
eloquent testimony of this, in fragments that can be placed from the imperial to
the late antique periods.17 These materials then resurface in the apparatuses that
13 Geminus cites Aratus and the text of the Phaenomena as a further source of support within
his own astronomical, geographical, and mathematical arguments, accompanying the citation
with comments adding precision, supplementing material, and offering judgements on particu-
lar technical-mathematical points, which function as part of his particular scientific exposition
(see Gem. 5.23–24 [Aratus, Phaen. 497–499], 7.7–8 [lines 537–540], 7.12–14 [lines 554–558], 8.13
[lines 733–739], 14.8 [lines 177–178]). Further, in 17.46–49 Geminus, discussing the scientific pre-
suppositions of the parapegmata (cf. below), cites Aratus alongside Boethus, Aristotle, Eudoxus,
and many other astronomers (ἕτεροι πλείονες τῶν ἀστρολόγων) as a representative of the tra-
dition of meteorological studies devoted to the signa of ‘physical’ type directly connected to the
phenomena and therefore used for ‘short-term forecasting’ (for an updated survey of this type
of text and on its relation to the tradition of parapegmata – which, however, is nonetheless a
distinct tradition – cf. in particular Sider 2007, 1–43). With this Geminus gives evidence not just of
his own scientific-popularizing reflections on the ‘meteorological’ section, too, of Aratus’ poem,
but also that there were similar reflections (at least on this part of the poem) in the lost Commen
tary of Boethus (cf. also Kidd 1997, 46). In fact – based on the text of Geminus (ὅθεν καὶ Βόηθος ὁ
φιλόσοφος ἐν τῷ τετάρτῳ βιβλίῳ τῆς Ἀράτου ἐξηγήσεως φυσικὰς τὰς αἰτίας ἀποδέδωκε τῶν τε
πνευμάτων καὶ ὄμβρων, ἐκ τῶν προειρημένων εἰδῶν τὰς προγνώσεις ἀποφαινόμενος) – in book
IV of this ‘commentary’ the philosopher Boethus is said to have reported and treated the physical
causes of the winds and precipitation, showing their connection with the σήματα/σημεῖα treated
by Aratus, which were useful for predicting the relevant phenomena precisely in virtue of this
relation of physical causality.
14 See in particular Martin 1956; Martin 1998, cxxvi–clxxviii.
15 See Luiselli 2011, 97–109.
16 See Luiselli 2011, 119–126.
17 See the edition of Luiselli 2011, equipped with a large commentary.
144 Martina Savio
accompany the text of Aratus in the medieval manuscripts in the form of intro-
ductory texts and scholia, to which we shall turn shortly. The exegetical tradition
covers the whole range of questions that could be raised by a text such as that of
the Phaenomena, from linguistic-lexical and metrical-prosodic aspects, to textual
criticism, through to the general exegesis and interpretation of the content of the
poem, thus also including mythological and astronomical/meteorological ques-
tions; it was certainly not limited to this last aspect, which in the papyri is in fact
touched on only in a few rare annotations (in P.Berol. inv. 5865, P.Oxy. 64 4426,
P.Oxy. 15 1807 + P.Köln 4 185), which are for the most part of a glossographic-par-
aphrastic type.18
Yet if the testimony of the papyri is combined with the information provided
by the other sources cited so far, the fact that the notes of strictly astronomical
nature are in the minority in the papyrus transmission of the text of Aratus does
not at all undermine the picture painted by the other sources, namely that Aratus
was used as a source of astronomical instruction, and this was at least a wide-
spread, if perhaps not its predominant use. As is in fact demonstrated both by
the Commentary of Hipparchus and that of Attalus discussed by him and by what
is attested by Geminus about the commentary of Boethus, this type of commen-
tary was not limited to clarifying the text of Aratus as an ancillary appendix to
it but, rather, had the purpose of expanding, supplementing, and/or correcting
it in order to exploit it as a means of exposition and popularization of scientific
content. For this reason it needed an autonomous editorial form and, at least in
the case of Hipparchus, one that took the form of a monograph rather than a
hypomnema; more generally, deeper ‘systematic’ inquiries of ‘technical’ astro-
nomical character would be unsuited to the form of brief marginal annotation or
short hypomnema entries such as those of P.Oxy. 64 4426.
In this light, it should also be borne in mind that reflection on the text under
the aspects of textual criticism, language, rhetoric, and expression not only does
not exclude its study at the technical-scientific level of content, but, to the con-
trary, is a necessary preliminary study for it. The correct philological constitution
of the text and the comprehension of the detail of what it says are a condition for
the correct understanding, evaluation, and assimilation of the content, especially
if it concerns specific considerations of a technical scientific type. The thoroughly
complementary character of these aspects of the analysis of Aratus’ text is explic-
itly demonstrated by Hipparchus’ commentary itself and by what it attests about
the commentary of Attalus. While, as has been noted, both these works explicitly
treated and discussed the poem of Aratus as a ‘technical’ astronomical text, their
18 On this cf. Maehler 1980; Dilcher/Parsons 1997; Luiselli 2011, 60–109, 127–150.
reflections on specific scientific content include, as a preliminary and/or supple-

mentary component, reflections of a typically philological nature, concerning the
correct constitution of the text based also on comparison of the various manu-
script witnesses, and rhetorical and interpretive reflections.19
Another clear indication that Aratus’ work was widely regarded as in essence
an astronomical text or manual can be found in the notice about how Aratus’ text
depended on that of Eudoxus, which claimed that, aside from a few rare devia-
tions, Aratus had essentially limited himself to transposing the technical prose
text of Eudoxus into the form of hexameter poetry. In Hipparchus’ Commentary,
this dependence is not just attested but also ‘documented’ through a series of
quotations from the works of the two authors set in comparison to each other.20
The historical truth of this picture offered by Hipparchus has been cast in serious
doubt in modern scholarly history, in particular by J. Martin.21 Given the loss of
the relevant works of Eudoxus (or, rather, those attributed to him), it is not pos-
sible to confirm it definitively. It may be that it is the reflections of Hipparchus,
or other shared sources now lost, that are themselves the ultimate source of
the notice that has entered the medieval tradition of one of the anonymous
Lives,22 which claims that Aratus composed the Phaenomena in response to a
19 Cf. e. g. Hipp. 1.3.2–3 (above in n. 11); 2.3.9: ἀναγκαῖον οὖν εἶναι δοκεῖ μοι, μὴ μετατιθέναι τὸν
στίχον, ὡς ὁ Ἄτταλος ὑποδεικνύει, ἐν πᾶσί γε δὴ τοῖς ἀντιγράφοις οὕτως αὐτοῦ γραφομένου; and
the further passages quoted and discussed by Tueller/Macfarlane 2009, 238–244, and Lightfoot
2017, 957–964.
20 See in particular Hipp. 1.2 and above in n. 8.
21 See Martin 1998, lxxxvi–cii.
22 Vita I (in the mss Γένος Ἀράτου καὶ βίος) in the edition of Martin 1974 (6–10). Maass (1892,
9–59; 1898, 25–85) had attributed this text, together with the one that in the manuscripts bears
the title Περὶ ἐξηγήσεως, to the Achilles who was author of the Περὶ τοῦ παντός (see below),
solely because in one branch of the tradition (the main witnesses of which are the mss Vati-
can, BAV, Vat. gr. 191 and 381) the Life and the Περὶ ἐξηγήσεως follow the Περὶ τοῦ παντός and
a series of (unpublished) astronomical definitions that are rubricated αἱ ἐξ ἑτέρων διαιρέσεις
(“definitions drawn from other writings/commentaries”), and are in their turn followed by the
subscriptio τῶν ἀράτου φαινομένων πρὸς εἰσαγωγήν ἐκ τῶν ἀχιλλέως. Subsequently, Martin
(1956, 130–132) demonstrated how a subscription such as this would be the result of an error by
the rubricator that had occurred in one of the lost manuscripts from which the relevant branch
of tradition derives: it would then in fact be a duplication of the inscriptio/subscriptio that in
the same manuscripts opens and closes the Περὶ τοῦ παντός (τῶν ἀράτου φαινομένων πρὸς
εἰσαγωγήν ἐκ τῶν ἀχιλλέως περὶ τοῦ παντός), which is therefore the only one of these texts that
should probably be attributed to Achilles. The most recent editor of Achilles (Di Maria 1996)
favoured Maass’s proposed attribution, but without adducing new arguments that undermine
the well-founded objections of Martin. In fact, the results of the work of recension accomplished
by Di Maria on the witnesses have themselves provided a further argument in support of Martin’s
thesis. The ms. Florence, BML, Plut. 28. 44, at the head of the line of tradition which, according
146 Martina Savio
request by Antigonus to ennoble the work of Eudoxus and make it more famous
(εὐδοξότερος)23 by transposing it into the code of epic poetic expression.24 The
authenticity of this information is suspect, to say the least, but it is nonetheless
important in relation to the common perception and to the forms of circulation of
the poem, as an astronomical text transposed into verse in order to make it more
appealing to a broad public, i. e. a not necessarily specialist one. The idea that the
poetic form made it easier to memorize and learn the scientific content, including
in the specific sector of teaching and/or popularizing astronomy, has at least one
other significant parallel: the elementary astronomical ‘manual’ (including an
extremely brief parapegma) subscribed by a certain Leptines in P.Paris 1 (Paris,
Louvre N 2329 Ro + N 2388 Ro, 1st half of 2nd cent. B.C.), commonly known (on the
basis of an acrostic epigram in iambic trimeters inscribed on the verso) as the “Ars
Eudoxi”,25 which appears in the papyrus in prosimetric form, alternating parts in
prose and parts in hexameters, and which had perhaps originally been composed
entirely in hexameter form (around the start of the 3rd cent. B.C.).26
As maintained in particular by A.-M. Lewis,27 the widespread habit of
regarding the text of Aratus as an aesthetically enhanced astronomical manual28
is, while not the only factor, perhaps the main and most constant element in
the extraordinary success and diffusion of the poem from the Hellenistic period
through to the Middle Ages, both in the Greek tradition and in Latin.
to Di Maria, goes back directly to the archetype, in fact bears only the text of the Περὶ τοῦ παντός,
whereas the two Vatican mss BAV, Vat. gr. 191 and 381, which bear also the other writings that
are followed by the ‘suspect’ subscription, derive, according to Di Maria, from a sub-archetype α,
and so to a subsequent stage of the tradition (see Di Maria 1996, xii–xxx).
23 Note the paronomastic play on the name Eudoxus (see the text in the next note).
24 See Vit. I Arat. pp. 7, 25–8,11 Martin (= [Achil. Astr.] p. 77, 19–78, 1 Maass; p. 60, 15–25 Di Maria):
γέγονε δὲ ὁ Ἄρατος κατὰ Ἀντίγονον τὸν τῆς Μακεδονίας βασιλέα, ὃς ἐπεκαλεῖτο Γονατᾶς. (…) ὃς
(scil. Ἄρατος) παρὰ τῷ βασιλεῖ γενόμενος καὶ εὐδοκιμήσας ἔν τε τῇ ἄλλῃ πολυμαθείᾳ καὶ <τῇ>
ποιητικῇ προετράπη ὑπ’αὐτοῦ τὰ Φαινόμενα γράψαι, τοῦ βασιλέως Εὐδόξου ἐπιγραφόμενον
βιβλίον Κάτοπτρον δόντος αὐτῷ καὶ ἀξιώσαντος τὰ ἐν αὐτῷ καταλογάδην λεχθέντα περὶ τῶν
φαινομένων μέτρῳ ἐντεῖναι καὶ ἅμα εἰπόντος ὡς “εὐδοξότερον ποιεῖς τὸν Εὔδοξον ἐντείνας τὰ
παρ’αὐτῷ κείμενα μέτρῳ”.
25 Ed. Blass 1887; Jones/Schironi forthcoming 2023; see Vandoni 1964, 71–78; Neugebauer 1975,
599–600, 686–689; Thompson 1988, 252–265; Lehoux 2007, 206–207; Legras 2011, 244–252; Del
Corso 2014, 307–308.
26 See in particular Blass 1887, 4–10; Neugebauer 1975, 686–687.
27 See Lewis 1992.
28 Cf. e. g. Lewis 1992, esp. 108–110, 113–118; Repellini 1993, 323–324; Kidd 1997, 18–21, 45; Martin
1998, lxxxv; van Noorden 2009; Tauber 2017, esp. 119, Mastorakou 2020.
The exegetical materials that have flowed into the medieval tradition,29 as
noted above, treat the text of Aratus in all its various dimensions and they are the
fruit of a centuries-long process of reworking, stratification, compilation, adapta-
tion, and contamination.30 In the surviving witnesses they appear in an ‘editorial
form’ ancillary to the text of Aratus. The component of their exegesis that is of
properly (‘technical’-)astronomical character is not only large, but is also very
likely to be at least in part constituted out of texts that originally circulated in
autonomous form and had as their own primary function the teaching/populari-
zation of the same astronomical-scientific material treated in the poem, for which
purpose they may have made use of the discussion, supplementation, and/or cor-
rection of Aratus’ poetic text. These are materials that were dismembered and
recompiled in the apparatuses of scholia, but also writings of astronomical char-
acter that were used in the manuscripts as brief texts introducing the poem and/
or materials that had flowed into these brief texts.
From this point of view, among others, one such work that has been discussed
is the text by Achilles (pseudo-Tatius)31 transmitted in the manuscripts under
the title Περὶ τοῦ παντός, inserted into the longer notice τῶν ἀράτου φαινομένων
πρὸς εἰσαγωγήν/πρὸς εἰσαγωγήν εἰς τὰ ἀράτου φαινόμενα (according to the two
formulations attested by the two branches of its transmission).32 Certainly, this
title designates the function of introducing the poem ascribed to this work, as to
others, and this is the reason why it was inserted into the witnesses in question.
Yet this title does not seem fully in line with the actual content of the short work,
which was perhaps originally larger than how it now appears in the witnesses33
and seems to have been composed instead as an introduction, elementary and
29 See the editions by Maass 1898; Martin 1974; for the scholia to the Latin translation of Ger-
manicus see Dell’Era 1979a; Dell’Era 1979b.
30 On the tradition of exegesis of Aratus see Maass 1892; Maass 1898, ix–lxxi; Martin 1956,
7–223; Martin 1974, iv–xxxv; Luiselli 2011. More generally on the complexity of the transmission
processes by which philological-exegetical materials have come together in the surviving wit-
nesses see Montanari/Pagani 2011; Montana/Porro 2014.
31 The original composition of which should probably be dated around the early 3rd cent. A.D.:
cf. Martin 1956, 132; Di Maria 1996, xi.
32 See above n. 22; Di Maria 1996, viii.
33 The hypothesis that the transmitted text consists only of some extracts from the original work
of Achilles is suggested by its titling (…) ἐκ τῶν ἀχιλλέως (…): cf. Martin 1956, 131–132. Pasquali
(1910, 218–227) proposed to identify the original version of Achilles’ work as the lost source of
some of the materials compiled in the scholia to the Homilies on the Hexaemeron of Basil of
Caesarea.
148 Martina Savio
doxographic in tone, to astronomical-cosmological knowledge.34 While it relies

on quotation and discussion of passages of the text of Aratus – along with those
of various other authors – it turns out not to have the exegesis or introduction of
the poem as its own primary scope.35
A substantially similar scenario to the one just sketched out concerning the
didactic-popularizing use of the Phaenomena can also be traced in what we know
of the catasterism tradition. This latter has in fact flowed into that same exeget-
ical tradition as a tool for explaining and supplementing the content of Aratus’
poem. All the medieval witnesses to the Greek text are involved in this process
of transmission, in which, along different lines of tradition, the original mate-
rials have been dismembered and reorganized to adapt them as commentary on
the work of Aratus, and then recomposed again into an autonomous compila-
tion, the so-called Epitome. The latter derives from a tradition analogous to that
of the excerpta included in the Aratus scholia, and its treatment of the individ-
ual constellations presents once again the ‘Aratean order’ in. It therefore does
not have any direct ‘transmission relation’ with the work (or works) from which
these materials ultimately derive. The title of a ‘star index’ included in the same
medieval tradition cites the name of Eratosthenes,36 but the hypothetical rela-
tion of these materials to the work attributed to Eratosthenes in the Suda under
the title Astronomy or Catasterisms37 is the subject of wide debate in the history
of research,38 and in the absence of any new textual data that may yet appear,
this is clearly destined to remain an open question. However, if we leave aside the
issue of what its relations to the output of Eratosthenes really were, the tradition,
and in particular the text of the Astronomy of Hyginus, certainly does attest that
a text explicitly attributed to Eratosthenes, and which already comprised broadly
the information that is found in the medieval witnesses cited above, was in circu-
lation already in the times of Hyginus (1st cent. A.D.) and was among the sources
he used for the star catalogue that occupies chapters II–III of his work on astron-
omy. In the Epitome and in the excerpta transmitted in the scholia, the treatment
of each constellation opens with the narration of the relevant catasteristic myth,
34 On the doxographic-didactic nature of the work of Achilles see in particular Mansfeld/Runia

1996, 299–306; Avgerinos 2009.
35 See Martin 1956, 131–132; Kidd 1997, 48.
36 See Maass 1898, 134–139; Pàmias/Geus 2007, 251–252.
37 See Sud. ε 2898, s. v. Ἐρατοσθένης: (…) ἔγραψε δὲ φιλόσοφα καὶ ποιήματα καὶ ἱστορίας,
Ἀστρονομίαν ἢ Καταστηριγμούς (…).
38 On the tradition of the text and its possible relations with the work of Eratosthenes see the
most recent edition Pàmias/Geus 2007 (and cf. the problems raised by earlier editions: Robert
1878; Olivieri 1897b; Rehm 1899a); and the studies Olivieri 1897a; Martin 1956, 35–126; Pàmias
2004; Geus 2002, 211–223.
for the most part including the citation of one or more authors whose literary
work treated the myth in question (or one version of it), followed by a description
of the design of the constellation and the contextual enumeration and position
within the design of the individual stars that compose it (astrothesia).
Aside from the question of the original form, overall spirit, and possible
authorship of the text, this type of astronomical-descriptive cataloguing consti-
tutes a tool for memorizing and learning to recognize the individual constellations
in the heavens. This is the didactic astronomical use to which Hyginus certainly
put these materials, and this also seems likely to be (at least) one of the reasons
why these materials, which in this sense complete and explain the descriptions
offered in the text of Aratus, have flowed into the tradition of the latter.39 On
this topic, finally, it is worth taking a further look at the purely mythographic
component of this tradition of catasterism writing. It was certainly accorded to
this specific element a didactic and cultural value that was independent of that
of the astronomical component,40 and as such (i. e. without being paired with the
astrothesia of the constellation to which each myth refers) it does in fact appear
in the marginalia to the text of the Phaenomena in one of the Aratus papyri.41 Yet
since these mythical narratives explain the origin of the name and iconography
of each constellation, they held a potential didactic function, also of a specifically
astronomical nature, because they made these names and iconographies, and
so also the groups of stars identified within them, more easily comprehensible
and memorable. Perhaps significantly, this is noted by one of the ancient sources
linked to the tradition of the text of Aratus which is also certainly of a didac-
tic-popularizing nature, namely the work of Achilles that has been mentioned
above. It traces the origin of how each constellation was assigned the name of
a mythical figure (and, with it, the contextual connection between the mythical
story and the birth of the constellation) to the need to make these constellations
more easily identifiable and memorable, that is, to make it easier to learn them.42
***
39 For some reflections on the didactic-popularizing potential of the materials that belong to the
catasterism tradition cf. e. g. Repellini 1993, 325; Pàmias/Geus 2007, 24–30; Cusset 2008, 124–135;
Pàmias 2008; Santoni 2009, 8–19, 26–28; Trachsel 2009.
40 Cf. in particular Pàmias 2008.
41 See Luiselli 2011, 48, 60–96.
42 See Achil. Astr. p. 58, 12–15 Di Maria: Ἕλληνες δὲ ταῦτα τὰ ὀνόματα ἔθεντο τοῖς ἄστροις ἀπὸ
ἐπισήμων ἡρώων πρὸς τὸ εὐκατάληπτα εἶναι καὶ εὔγνωστα· ἀνώνυμα γὰρ ὄντα πολλὴν παρεῖχε
ταραχὴν τοῖς περὶ ταῦτα σπουδάζουσιν.
150 Martina Savio
As regards the structure and type of data provided in such ‘catalogues’, the
element that is most significant at the level of function is the fact that they all, if
at times in different ways, depict in textual form what appears physically on the
celestial vault to the observer, as a sort of ‘star map’ that makes it possible to iden-
tify the individual constellations and stars (or, at least, the ones that are brighter
and hence more easily identifiable) of which they are formed.
For the constellations, what is indicated is the name (sometimes associated
with its mythical ‘origin’: see above) and the iconography, which is described by
associating the ‘part of the design’ with a star or stars that ‘are inserted’ in it, or
rather which ‘represent’ it. These texts normally also provide, in variously explicit
form depending on the individual case, a relative mapping, i. e. information con-
cerning the position of the individual constellations is given relative to others
(following ‘courses’ in the layout prompted by specific ordering principles); this
information clearly has the function of localizing each constellation through the
points of reference provided by the constellations closest to it.43
Yet these ‘maps’, at least starting from what Hipparchus attributes to the
work of Eudoxus, also explicitly assume the geometrical model of the celestial
sphere and its fundamental geometrical-theoretical elements (the poles, arctic
and antarctic circles, tropics, equator, zodiacal circle/ecliptic). These are used as
‘absolute’ points of reference in the mapping, by indicating (in a desultory or sys-
tematic way, depending on the source) of the constellation’s position in relation
to these elements.44
This ‘catalogue tradition’ is thus fully a part, though to different levels
depending on the source, of the process of ‘geometrization’ of space that lies at
the foundation of the birth and growth of Greek mathematical astronomy, and in
particular it is linked to the use of the model of the revolving celestial sphere as
an instrument for observation and study of the stars,45 and which in its turn had
the purpose of grasping their cycles of visibility in scientific-geometrical terms
(see below).
43 As well as the expository structure of the surviving catalogic-astronomical sources, a reflex

of such a mechanism both of exposition/textual construction and of teaching the ‘map of the
stars’ may perhaps be identifiable in a passage of the astronomical manual of the Paris papyrus
(Louvre N 2329 Ro + N 2388 Ro: see above), coll. VII 5–VIII 10, which bears some geometrical con-
figurations, line segments, circumferences, triangles, and quadrilaterals, which can be ‘traced’
by linking together theoretically some of the more visible stars of different constellations as if
they were points in a drawing.
44 Cf. e. g. Aratus, Phaen. 462–556; [Eratosth.] Cat. epit. 2, 15, 42 Pàmias/Geus; Hipp. 1.4–11 and
passim (with discussion of statements attributed to Eudoxus); Gem. 3 and passim.
45 Cf. e. g. Neugebauer 1975, 575–578 and passim; Repellini 1993, 318–334; Evans 1998, 75–127;
Aujac 2007–2008, 6–7; Bianchetti 2007–2008, 25–27; Montelle 2020.
Another element that is organically connected to this catalogic-didactic

tradition is the graphic element, both plane and solid. The presence of two-di-
mensional graphic representations paired with the text of Aratus and with the
catasteristic materials is well attested by their medieval tradition. It now seems
beyond doubt that this graphic tradition goes back in some way or degree to the
earliest tradition of such texts, in which in any case the ‘design’ (or iconography)
of the individual constellations certainly plays an essential role, whether it be
realized concretely or just projected mentally.46 The use of three-dimensional
models of the celestial sphere marked with the constellations and the geomet-
rical-theoretical elements of the model, namely the poles and the circles, is well
attested by the surviving sources, including those of didactic-popularizing type,
in particular in the work of Geminus. Also attested, above all by Ptolemy, is the
use of this type of instrument by specialists in their operations of observing and
calculating.47
Finally, a quite important and controversial aspect concerning this type of
text is the presence not only of a relative (‘reciprocal’) mapping and one in rela-
tion to the circles of the sphere that we have mentioned, but also of numerical
data giving specific spherical coordinates of the stars that compose the constel-
lations.
As is well known, the catalogue of Ptolemy (Alm. 7–8) – i. e. a technical-spe-
cialist text – is the only star catalogue preserved by the tradition in which the
stars, while still ordered and defined by the constellation to which they belong
and the position they each hold in its iconography, are systematically listed,
with each accompanied by a complete set (longitude and latitude) of spherical
coordinates – specifically: ecliptic ones – and a particular degree of brightness
(magnitude), according to a numerical scale from 1 (maximum brightness) to 6
(minimum brightness). One of the questions about this catalogue that even today
remains open and widely debated concerns the sources used by Ptolemy to work
these out, and especially the extent of his debt to Hipparchus.
46 See Martin 1956, 32–72 passim (with the earlier bibliography cited and discussed there) and
in particular 69–70; Zucker 2008; and the work of the research project on Astronomical Illumi-
nated Manuscripts of the Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, devised and directed by Anna San-
toni (http://certissimasigna.sns.it/index.php), in particular the contributions of the latter and of
F. Guidetti in Guidetti/Santoni 2013.
47 See Aujac 1970; Aujac 1975, lxv–lxx; Graßhoff 1990, 190–191 and passim; Swerdlow 1992,
173–175; Evans 1998, 78–87, 141–156; Evans/Berggren 2006, 27–34; Tauber 2017, 119–121; Hoffmann
2018; Hannah 2020a, 24–28, 38.
152 Martina Savio
As regards Hipparchus’ work, the sources taken as whole, especially Ptolemy

himself, attest the existence of a work different from the Commentary that was
probably of technical-specialist type and dedicated to the systematic study of the
fixed stars, in particular to the calculation/determination of their precise position
on the celestial sphere in terms of spherical coordinates, and to the definition of
their degree of brightness. However, the sources do not allow us to reconstruct
with certainty the nature and structure of this work, the type of data that were or
were not provided in it, or the method or methods used by Hipparchus to acquire
these data.48 But what is important here, and a point on which the sources do
not seem to leave any doubt, is that Hipparchus, both in the Commentary and
in at least one other work, used the system of equatorial spherical coordinates
to define the ‘absolute’ and exact position of at least some stars on the model of
the celestial sphere, and that there is no positive evidence that any similar activ-
ity was pursued, or at least not in a systematic way, by astronomers before Hip-
parchus.49 The other quite secure datum that can be gleaned on this point from
the state of the tradition is that more generally this type of measurement or calcu-
lation, given its complexity, ought not to have been particularly frequent even in
the work of the specialists, and consequently that there is a very high probability
that the data provided in the sources, even when not explicitly attributed, go back
to the original workings of a few people. Among such figures, Hipparchus is des-
ignated by the sources as a reference figure.50
On the other hand, those texts linked to the catalogue tradition of ‘populariz-
ing’ cast that also bear specific coordinates for the stars treated are an exception
in the surviving tradition as a whole. In particular, this type of data is exclusively
present in the Commentary of Hipparchus; in a papyrus fragment P.Aberd. 12,
datable to the second or third century A.D., perhaps from the Fayum; and in a
48 On the information provided by Ptolemy and other sources on observations and calculations
to define the coordinates of stars, and their rarity and problematic nature, but also on the his-
tory of the working out of the data provided in Ptolemy’s catalogue and the significance of the
possible debt of the latter to the observations and calculations of Hipparchus, see in particular
Neugebauer 1975, 280–291; Toomer 1981, 216–217; Maeyama 1984; Graßhoff 1990; Swerdlow 1992;
Duke 2002b; Hoffmann 2018, with the passages of the Almagest, the data drawn from the latter
work and other sources, and the series of previous studies that are considered and extensively
discussed in these works.
49 See previous note. On the system of equatorial coordinates used by Hipparchus see in par-
ticular the study by Duke 2002a. On the debated possibility that ecliptic coordinates were used
by Hipparchus himself and more generally prior to Ptolemy see above all Gundel 1936, 133–134
and passim; Neugebauer 1975, 286–287; Graßhoff 1990, 67–72; Swerdlow 1992, 176.
50 See the studies cited in the previous two notes and the sources discussed in them.
catalogue extract relating to the three circumpolar constellations of Ursa Major,

Ursa Minor, and Draco, which has entered into the Aratus Latinus.51
This last extract,52 clearly the result of translation from an originally
Greek text, indicates the ‘ideal quadrilateral’ within which each constellation
is inscribed, i. e. it provides the coordinates of the stars that form the northern,
southern, western, and eastern limits of the constellation, as well as the length of
the arcs of latitude and longitude that are defined by these limits. Significantly,
the data in question follow a system of equatorial coordinates like that used by
Hipparchus, and with the use, which is more frequent in Hipparchus’ work, of
the definition of latitude as the angular distance along the meridian from the
pole rather than from the equator. The source of the specific data in the extract
cannot be the Commentary, since these kinds of data are there indicated only for
the constellations involved in phenomena of rising and setting53 (which is at the
heart of the treatment in the work). However, the data not only correspond to
those that could have been recorded in the time of Hipparchus and are expressed
according to the same formulations used by him in the Commentary, but one of
them (the latitude of α UMi – the star at the end of the Little Bear’s tail – at the
southern limit of the constellation, which is the sole case in which the sources
51 For the discussion and superseding of the hypothesis of Rehm (1899b) that the extract in
question derives in some way from the tradition of the Catasterisms, and that in the original
version of the work attributed to Eratosthenes these numerical data (coordinates) were also pro-
vided for each of the constellations treated, see Neugebauer 1975, 287–288, 577–578. The other
text currently known to report specific coordinates for a series of stars, namely the one that has
entered the tradition of astrological material of the Liber Hermetis Trismegisti of the ms. Lon-
don, British Library, Harley 3731 (ff. 1r–50r), a manuscript probably written in 1431 (see Gundel
1936, 3), published by W. Gundel (1936: for the relevant section of the text see pp. 23, 32–25, 13
[and cf. also pp. 50–72]), contains exclusively data concerning the longitude of the stars cited,
whereas no data is given concerning the latitude (for discussion of the data that have flowed into
the text and their possible origin see in particular Gundel 1936, 115–282; Graßhoff 1990, 67–72).
The content, too, of this text presents elements that could suggest some relation to the work of
Hipparchus, both in terms of phrasing, which often recalls that of the Commentary to the Phae
nomena, and in terms of data, which may possibly be compatible with those that could have
been recorded in the time of Hipparchus (see Gundel 1936, 133–134 and passim; Neugebauer 1975,
286–287; Graßhoff 1990, 67–72).
52 For the text see Maass 1898, 183–184, 186–187, 189; for interpretation and commentary on the
text, with specific reference to the possible relations to the work of Hipparchus, see Neugebauer
1975, 288–291.
53 At the latitude considered by Hipparchus, the constellations treated in the extract are encom-
passed within the arctic circle and therefore are “always visible” in the night sky, without either
rising or setting, with the exception of the ‘paws’ of Ursa Major (which, however, are not part of
the portion of the constellation that coincides with the Great Wain, which is the main element of
this constellation treated by Hipparchus: cf. e. g. 1.5.6–7).
154 Martina Savio
allow us to make the comparison) also coincides exactly with the value that
Ptolemy attributes explicitly to Hipparchus in the Geography (1.7.4). By far the
most likely hypothesis is thus that such data ultimately go back to another work
by Hipparchus, probably his lost work on mapping the stars.54
A similar scenario can be seen in P.Aberd. 12. It records expressions that
clearly refer to the design and composition of at least two constellations, in all
probability Ursa Minor and Draco, using formulations similar to those of the
catalogic-didactic tradition that has been considered so far. At the same time,
it contains the indication of at least two numerical data relating to the specific
coordinates of the stars that compose them, namely the indication of latitude, in
this case too, in the form of distance from the pole, which, as has been noted, is
‘typically Hipparchan’. The papyrus is thus a further indication that a type of text
was in circulation that was intended for the elementary knowledge of the con-
stellations similar to that which has flowed into the extract of Aratus Latinus.55
These two sources are significant because they attest the existence of a type
of catalogue-text that combines, on the one hand, the ‘structural-formal’ char-
acteristics and didactic-popularizing function of ‘descriptive’ catalogues such as
that of Aratus and the catasterism tradition, with, on the other hand, the type
of numerical data that relate to ‘absolute mapping’ of the constellations as pro-
vided in the Commentary of Hipparchus (though only for some of them or some
of the stars that compose them and not in a systematic way) and the ‘specialized
systematic catalogues’. This type of cataloguing essentially constitutes a kind of
compromise, which provides the elementary/basic map of the constellations on
the model of the sphere, but in a more precise form and thus also, as we will see,
a more functionally useful one.
The fact that in the medieval tradition just one fragmentary witness has sur-
vived of this type of catalogue including the constellations’ essential coordinates
does not necessarily mean that it was not originally much more widespread.
Above all if we bear in mind that, as we have seen, the principal surviving channel
of transmission of the non-specialist level of catalogue texts substantially coin-
54 Cf. Neugebauer 1975, 288–291.

55 See Savio forthcoming. Luiselli has highlighted how the textual character of the fragment
is equally compatible with both a hypomnema-type text on Aratus’ poem and with a catalogue
structure (see Luiselli 2011, 151–152). However, its possible didactic-astronomical function is
equally valid whether it proposed this treatment in order to supplement and specify the descrip-
tion of the constellations in question provided by the text of Aratus, or, on the other hand, if it
were part of a catalogue entirely independent of Aratus’ text. The content of the papyrus Aber-
deen 127, too, if the term θρόνος readable in it was used to designate part of the constellation
Cassiopeia, could belong to an analogous textual tradition (see Savio forthcoming).
cides with the tradition of Aratus’ poem and its exegesis, it seems at least a legit-
imate hypothesis that at certain moments of this transmission process the more
technical annotations and numerical data, such as those present in P.Aberd. 12
and preserved in the extract of Aratus Latinus, may have been pruned. On the
other hand, the functional role played by such data even in contexts in which
the material was being popularized to a non-specialist public, and above all, as
we shall see shortly, in connection with the ‘practical’ applications of this type of
knowledge, is without doubt attested by the Commentary of Hipparchus itself (cf.
in particular books II–III).
***
It is certainly true that astronomical knowledge, and in primis that of the stars and
their cycles of visibility, had in the Greco-Roman world acquired broader value
and implications, beyond the strictly scientific-astronomical aspect, including on
the religious, astrological, philosophical, and more generally ‘intellectual’ plane
(in the context of artistic-literary production, philosophical inquiry, and teaching
at various levels). Yet it is also undoubtedly true that it can be seen to be con-
nected right from its origins to the need to meet demands of a practical-social
nature, above all that of reckoning the time and calendar (also in connection with
meteorological ‘prediction’, due to the relation that tends to exist between the
seasonal period and particular atmospheric-climatic conditions)56 and the need
to know/represent physical-geographical space.57
The reckoning of daily and annual-seasonal time is the main object of activ-
ity of the earliest astronomers-mathematicians of the classical period as attested
in the sources.58 The (apparent) ecliptic-zodiacal movement of the Sun and the
synodic cycles of lunar motion were the object equally of specialist study59 and
56 Cf. e. g. Neugebauer 1962b; Arrighetti 1963; Gibbs 1976; van der Waerden 1984a; Evans 1998,
129–141, 163–204; Hannah 2002; Hannah 2005; Lehoux 2007; Sider 2007; Hannah 2009; Jones
2009, 343–346; Hannah 2015; Jones 2017; Hannah 2020a; Hannah 2020b.
57 Cf. e. g. Aujac 1966, 113–216; Fraser 1972, I, 520–538; Dilke 1985, 21–38 and passim; Jacob 1993,
393–420, 426–430; Bianchetti 1998, 39–80, passim; Magnani 2002, 241–245, passim; Aujac 2007–
2008; Bianchetti 2007–2008; Wright 2000; Talbert 2017, in particular 111–136; Geus 2020.
58 Concerning the activity of Euctemon, Meton, Eudoxus, and Callippus cf. e. g. Toomer 1974;
van der Waerden 1984a; 1984b; Hannah 2002; Hannah 2013.
59 As well as the activity of the astronomers cited in the previous note, one may consider e. g.
work to calculate the duration of the solar year, the astronomical seasons, and the lunar cycles,
which the sources attribute to Hipparchus: see e. g. Neugebauer 1975, 292–299, 306–319.
156 Martina Savio
of popularization60 as absolute measures of time, in various ways on the basis of

different calendrical systems.
Further, telling the daily and annual-seasonal time, and predicting the cli-
matic conditions that tended to be associated with the latter, and identifying the
relation between the civil calendar and the lunar-solar cycles are the main practi-
cal and instrumental application of knowledge of an astronomical-mathematical
nature attested by the papyri61 and by other documentary sources.62
In this perspective it is precisely the phenomena of visibility of certain par-
ticularly recognizable stars or constellations, and specifically their observable
heliacal risings or settings (when, that is, the star or constellation can be seen
rising or setting for the first or last time just before dawn or just after sunset), that
are the earliest and most widespread tools for identifying the annual-seasonal
moment, well beyond the restricted circle of specialists in astronomy.63 This
‘practical-instrumental’ reflection, of calendrical-seasonal type, on the phases of
certain stars, together with the use of the latter as absolute points of reference
for orientation (above all, but not exclusively, in navigation), thanks to their rel-
ative ease of observation – attested also in other ancient cultures –, precedes the
birth of mathematical astronomy and the scientific-systematic study of such phe-
nomena. In the sources available to us, this is already evidently presupposed and
clearly attested by the text of Homer and of Hesiod.64 With the advent of mathe-
matical astronomy and the creation of the model of the revolving celestial sphere,
this empirical use evolved into a broader and more systematic scientific inquiry,
60 Cf. e. g. Aratus, Phaen. 1–13, 550–568, 729–818; P.Paris 1 (“Ars Eudoxi”), coll. I–IV; XIII–XVII;
XXI–XXIII; Gem. passim and esp. 1.7–18, 6–9, 13, 17.
61 Cf. e. g. Baccani 1992, 29–37; Jones 2009, 343–346. Among the papyri published to date, as
well as the so-called “Ars Eudoxi” (Paris, Louvre N 2329 Ro + N 2388 Ro) – see above – a ‘manual’
devoted almost entirely to the elementary exposition of principles and data of more or less direct
calendrical-chronological use, particularly significant under this profile are the papyri listed in
the appendix at the end of this paper. For the ‘diffusion’ of annotations of the months of the cal-
endar in the papyri cf. Baplu 2008.
62 Cf. in particular the documents analysed by Gibbs 1976; Evans 1998, 78–87, 141–156; Wright
2000; Evans/Berggren 2006, 27–34; Lehoux 2007; Hannah 2009; Jones 2017; Talbert 2017.
63 Probably thanks both to their relative ease of observation and their ‘universal’ importance
(for the same latitudinal bands), i. e., they made possible an unambiguous reference to a deter-
mined period of the year, leaving aside the different local civil calendrical systems. As well as
the poems of Homer and Hesiod (see next note), Aratus’ poem (and part of its exegesis), and
the manual of Geminus (above all ch. xvii and the parapegma ‘attached’ to the manual), cf. the
texts and documents cited and discussed by Lehoux 2007; Jones 2017, 95–103; Graßhoff 2020; in
particular on the ‘parapegma tradition’ see below n. 68.
64 Cf. in particular the passages cited and discussed in Kidd 1997, 12–13; Evans 1998, 3–5; Han-
nah 2005, 18–27.
in primis in the study of the geometric-kinematic correlation between the posi-

tion of the Sun in its annual (apparent) motion along the zodiacal circle/ecliptic,
on which the seasonal moment depends,65 and the corresponding phenomena of
visibility (heliacal risings and settings) of the stars at a determined latitude.66 The
practical-instrumental importance of this type of scientific-astronomical reflec-
tion is attested in particular by the so-called parapegmata, astro-meteorological
calendars in which for each day of the solar or civil calendar a series of data is
indicated,67 the specific typology of which in part varies depending on the par-
ticular document.68 Nonetheless, in these instruments too, worked out originally
by specialists in the discipline of mathematical astronomy but of wide practical
and social use, the principal phenomena of visibility of the stars remained the
primary indicators of the ecliptic-zodiacal position of the Sun and thus of the
seasonal period and climate.
There was another fundamental practical function assigned to knowledge
of the stars and the phenomena associated with them: their progressive passage
across the line of the horizon and/or of the meridian during the night became an
instrument for reckoning the time at night,69 for which it fulfilled a role anal-
ogous to that played by the (apparent) daily motion of the Sun, utilized by the
sundials70 (and the shadow tables)71 to reckon the time during the day.
The mapping of the constellations on to the sphere was, naturally, a prelim-
inary and propaedeutic phase of astronomical-geometrical study of such period-
ically visible phenomena and their connection to daily and annual time. In the
same way, in the popularization of such knowledge and its practical application,
65 And therefore the variation of climatic conditions that tend to be associated with each sea-
sonal phase.
66 Cf. e. g. Neugebauer 1975, 760–763 and passim; Aujac 1979, 19–27, 66–134; Evans/Berggren
2006, 58–72; Lehoux 2007, 10–12 and passim.
67 Relative to the position of the Sun along the ecliptic – with the indication of the solstices
and equinoxes and of the consequent duration of the seasons, the limits of which are marked
by them –, the phases of the Moon, the duration of daylight, and to some ‘seasonal/periodic’
climatic events.
68 On the ‘parapegma tradition’ see Rehm 1941; van der Waerden 1984a; van der Waerden
1984b; van der Waerden 1985; Evans 1998, 190–204; Hannah 2002; Hannah 2005, 59–62; Lehoux
2007; Sider 2007, 1–10, passim; Jones 2009, 343–346.
69 See Aratus, Phaen. 554–568; Hipp. 2–3; Gem. 7; and cf. Polyb. 9.15.1–15; Evans 1998, 95–99.
70 See Gibbs 1976; Evans 1998, 129–141; Wright 2000; Cuomo 2001, 152–153; Hannah 2009, pas
sim; Talbert 2017; Geus 2020, 235–236; Hannah 2020b, 327–339.
71 A means for ‘calculating’ the hour of day (used in the Greek world at least from the classical
period), a sort of ‘surrogate’ for sundials: see Neugebauer 1964, 62–70; Neugebauer 1975, 736–746;
Hannah 2020b, 323–326.
158 Martina Savio
knowing the form and position of the constellations on the sphere (beginning
from the circumpolar constellations which formed the primary point of reference
for gradually identifying the ‘next’ constellations) was a necessary condition for
projecting the model onto the physical-real sky while observing it, and hence also
for learning to recognize the relevant phenomena and to use them as instruments
for time-reckoning (as also to use them more effectively as navigational instru-
ments).
Among the didactic-popularizing texts considered so far, those that are
authored texts known from the direct tradition present these practical functions
as one of the main reasons why it is important to know the constellations and the
phenomena associated with them, and to popularize such knowledge.
As is well known, these are in fact the functions that Aratus, from the proe-
mium (lines 1–13) onward and throughout the whole astronomical section of the
poem (lines 550–568 and passim), explicitly attributes to knowledge of the stars
and their cycles of visibility: these cycles reveal to humans the ecliptic-zodiacal
position of the Sun, on which depends the succession of the seasons and the cli-
matic conditions that characterize them, to which human socio-economic activ-
ities, in primis agriculture, must be matched. As regards the reckoning of time at
night Aratus (lines 554–568) reports that half of the zodiacal circle rises and sets
every night and that each night of the solar year lasts as long as the correspond-
ing half of the circle takes to pass across the line of the horizon; he reports that
whoever wants to know what moment it is at night will have to observe which
zodiacal constellation is rising at the given moment, combined with knowledge
of the ecliptic-zodiacal position of the Sun in the given period of the year (which
can be recorded in its turn by observation of the phenomena of heliacal rising
and setting of the constellations/stars). In relation to this specific chronographic
function of observing the progressive rising of the zodiacal constellations, Aratus
(lines 562–732) also provides a series of indications about the simultaneous rising
and setting of other constellations, for the latitudes ‘of Greece’. These could be
used as substitute indicators if the rising of the zodiacal constellation were not
observable in a given location and/or moment due to meteorological disturbances
or other obstacles to visibility obscuring the most eastern part of the horizon.
Hipparchus devotes around half of his whole commentary (books II–III) to
offering a series of data (and explanations) that constitute the correction and
completion, or even better the superseding, of this part of Aratus’ poem (and of
the work of Eudoxus supposed to be restated in it: see above). He explicitly indi-
cates that the primary motivation for his treatment of this specific subject and for
the data he provides in connection with it is their greater practical efficacy and
utility in reckoning the time at night, whereas their greater correctness and pre-
cision at the level of astronomy and mathematics is given as a ‘secondary’ moti-
vation.72 Hipparchus (2.2–3.4) provides information that is in part analogous to

that of Aratus, but in a form that is quite a lot more detailed and more technically
defined. Specifically, he indicates the following (for the latitude of Rhodes, circa
36° N) for each constellation lying between the two circles, arctic and antarctic,73
organizing these constellations into three groups, the boreal, austral, and zodi-
acal:
1. the data (see the following points) relevant to their rising and setting (organ-
ized into two sections dedicated respectively to the rising and setting), noting
which star of the constellation rises/sets first and which rises/sets last,
2. the arc of the zodiacal circle that, respectively, rises or sets and the arc that
passes through the meridian simultaneously to the rising or setting of each
constellation,
3. a series of stars that culminate at the meridian simultaneously to, respectively,
the beginning and the end of the rising or setting of each constellation, and
4. the time of rising and of setting.
These data make it possible, as Hipparchus himself stresses, to use the observa-
tion of the stars to calculate the time at night in absolute terms, namely in equi-
noctial hours (1/24 of the solar day), and in terms that are more precise. Indeed
such simultaneous phenomena make it possibile to project onto the real sky the
theoretical-geometrical elements of the model of the sphere, and in particular
to use the zodiacal circle as a succession of 12 arcs of 30° (τὰ δωδεκατημόρια),
72 See Hipp. 2.1–4: (…) ὁ Ἄρατος (…) φησὶν (lines 559–568) οὖν ἐν τούτοις μάλιστα μὲν ἡμᾶς
ἐπιγνώσεσθαι τὴν ὥραν (scil. τῆς νυκτός), ἐὰν αὐτῶν τι τῶν δώδεκα ζῳδίων θεωρῶμεν ἀνατέλλον.
(…) ἀγνοήσει τὴν τῆς νυκτὸς ὥραν ὁ τῷ προειρημένῳ συλλογισμῷ χρώμενος. (…) οὐδ’ ἂν αὐτὸ τὸ
ζῴδιον βλέπῃ τις ἀνατεταλκός, δυνατόν ἐστιν ἀκριβῶς τὴν ὥραν τῆς νυκτὸς συλλογίσασθαι κατὰ
τὸν προειρημένον τρόπον. (…) πῶς ἂν εἴη δυνατὸν ἐκ τῆς τοιαύτης τῶν δώδεκα ζῳδίων ἐπιτολῆς
<τὴν> τῆς νυκτὸς ὥραν συλλογίσασθαι; (…) δῆλον ὅτι πολλῷ μᾶλλον ἀγνοήσει τὴν ὥραν ὁ ἐκ τῆς
ἀνατολῆς τῶν φαινομένων ζῳδίων συλλογισμὸς αὐτῶν. (…) ἕκαστον δὲ τούτων διασαφήσομεν
κατὰ συνεγγισμὸν ἕως ἀδιαφόρου παραλλαγῆς. διότι γὰρ ἡ τοιαύτη πραγματεία πολλῷ τε τῶν
ὑπὸ τῶν ἀρχαίων συντεταγμένων ἐστὶν εὐχρηστοτέρα καὶ πρὸς πολλὰ συντείνει τῶν κατὰ
ἀστρολογίαν θεωρημάτων (…). It should be noted that already in the introduction Hipparchus
presents the main reason for his own activity revising the positions of Eudoxus-Aratus in terms
of its greater (didactic) utility, which he connects primarly with a greater scientific-theoretical
precision (see in particular Lightfoot 2017, 960–967), but also with the ‘practical’ aspect/use of
mathematical astronomy (μαθηματικὴ ἐμπειρία): see Hipp. 1.1.4: (…) τὸ δὲ συνεῖναι τὰ λεγόμενα
περὶ τῶν οὐρανίων ὑπ’αὐτοῦ (scil. Ἀράτου), τίνα τε συμφώνως τοῖς φαινομένοις ἀναγέγραπται
καὶ τίνα διημαρτημένως, τοῦτ’ὠφελιμώτατον ἡγήσαιτ’ ἄν τις καὶ μαθηματικῆς ἴδιον ἐμπειρίας;
1.1.11: (…) διότι γὰρ ἕκαστον τούτων συντείνει πρὸς πολλὰ καὶ χρήσιμα τῶν ἐν τοῖς μαθήμασι
θεωρημάτων (…).
73 And which therefore both are visible at the latitude in question and rise and set.
160 Martina Savio
each with its own time of rising calculated mathematically, and not as the series
of the 12 ‘actual’ and directly observable zodiacal constellations. Precisely this is
the weakness, defined above all in terms of its poor practical-chronographical
effectiveness/functionality, of the method proposed in Aratus’ poem that Hip-
parchus (2.1–4) claims he wants to supersede: the ‘real’ zodiacal constellations in
fact occupy arcs of the zodiacal circle of varying length and latitudinally too they
are not all inscribed within the zodiacal band; further, every constellation has a
different time of rising/setting. Therefore, the method proposed in the Phaenom
ena is extremely/excessively approximate, both because it is limited to recording
the time at night in relative-seasonal terms, i. e. as fractions of the duration of
the night at a given moment of the year, and also because such fractions, given
the different time of rising of each constellation, are not of equal duration, i. e.,
the rising of each zodiacal constellation does not homogeneously occupy 1/6 of
the nocturnal time on a given day. This same avowedly functional role for ‘practi-
cal’-chronographical purposes – reported in first place ahead of the applications
and uses of strictly mathematical-astronomical kind and of to some degree ‘spe-
cialist/advanced’ level74 – is said by Hipparchus, further, to be the motivation for
the content of the final chapter (3.5) of the Commentary. This chapter is entirely
dedicated to the subdivision of the sphere into 24 ‘semi-meridians’/equinoctial
hours (beginning from the one passing through the summer solstitial point) and
to the contextual indication of the series of stars that are found in correspondence
with them. The observation of the latter makes it possible to project such lines
mentally onto the sky and to use their successive culmination, which marks the
passage of one equinoctial hour, as a ‘giant clock’.
Geminus does not provide the series of specific data, but nonetheless seems
to presuppose the contextual use by his own audience of texts similar to those
mentioned so far, perhaps including that of Hipparchus (repeatedly cited by
him).75 This seems to be the case both in the catalogue of constellations (ch. III),
of which only the list of names is presented (organized according to the same
ratio system as Hipparchus) at least in the transmitted text of the manual, accom-
panied by some brief information about their relative positions and some of the
74 See Hipp. 3.5.1a: (…) εὔχρηστον εἶναι νομίζω καὶ τὸ παρακολουθεῖν ἡμᾶς, τίνες τῶν ἀπλανῶν
ἀστέρων ἀπέχουσιν ἀπ’ἀλλήλων κατὰ τὸ ἑξῆς ὡριαῖα ἰσημερινὰ διαστήματα. τοῦτο γὰρ ἡμῖν
εὔχρηστόν ἐστι πρός τε τὸ τὴν ὥραν τῆς νυκτὸς ἀκριβῶς συλλογίζεσθαι καὶ πρὸς τὸ τοὺς
ἐκλειπτικοὺς τῆς σελήνης χρόνους καὶ ἕτερα πλείονα κατανοεῖν τῶν ἐν ἀστρολογίᾳ θεωρημάτων.
75 On the particular concordance between the ‘scientific approach’ of the manual of Geminus
and that which the other sources trace back to, or at least clearly associate also with, Hipparchus
cf. in particular Dicks 1972, 345; Aujac 1975, lxxxvi; Neugebauer 1975, 579–587; Repellini 1993,
329; Evans/Berggren 2006, 14–15, 27, 116 n. 11, 224 n. 19, passim.
more visible stars that compose them, and also in relation to their cycles of visi-
bility during the night and in the course of the year (ch. VII, XIII–XIV, XVII). He
also dedicates much space to explaining the theoretical-geometrical presupposi-
tions and implications related to the understanding, and application to reckon-
ing time, of the same phenomena as are treated by Aratus and Hipparchus (cf. in
particular ch. I, III–V, VI 44–50, VII, XIII–XIV, XVII).
Finally, the practical benefit of cataloguing and mapping the constellations
in relation to the agricultural cycles and to navigation is still indicated, as in
Aratus’ poem, as the ‘primary’ reason for the interest and significance of such
knowledge also in the work by Achilles.76
***
In conclusion, the complex of data provided by the sources concerning writings

with astronomical-catalogue content makes it possible to identify among them a
specific textual current, composed of texts that differ among themselves in their
structure and technical-scientific level (especially in relation to the presence or
not of the specific coordinates of the stars) but all sharing the same didactic-pop-
ularizing function, which is widely acknowledged in them, at least at the level of
use (and for a series of them also at the level of composition). As has already been
pointed out in the past, this very function probably constitutes one of the main
reasons for the success of these texts over the course of the tradition. At the same
time, this success represents one of the clearest testimonia to a specific diffusion
of this subject matter in non-specialist contexts.
The reasons for this diffusion are certainly varied, and differ depending on
the specific contexts, and historical-cultural phase. As has already been men-
tioned (see above pp. 140–141, 143–144, 149, and esp. 155), knowledge of the stars,
together with other elementary astronomical notions, was invested, in contexts
that were not strictly specialist and above all at the didactic-popularizing level,
with a cultural and intellectual significance in a broad sense.77 Yet among these
76 See Achil. Astr. p. 58, 15–18 Di Maria: περὶ πολλοῦ δὲ μάλιστα τούτων (scil. τῶν ἀπλανῶν
ἄστρων) τὴν γνῶσιν ἐποιοῦντο εἰδέναι οἱ περὶ γεωργίαν καὶ ναυτιλίαν τὸν βίον ἔχοντες· ἐκ γὰρ
τῶν ἀνατολῶν καὶ δύσεων αὐτῶν τὸν καιρὸν τοῦ πλοῦ καὶ τοῦ τρυγητοῦ ἐσημειοῦντο.
77 Among other options, one should not dismiss the possibility of a link between this type of
text and astrological practice too, though admittedly the sources that attest reflection on an
astrological function and influence of the non-zodiacal stars/constellations on human exist-
ence, and their cataloguing-mapping conceived in view of such a function, are decidedly rare
and all rather late: see above all the text that has flowed into the Liber Hermetis edited by Gundel
1936 (pp. 23–25: see above n. 51) and those cited – in particular an anonymous text of A.D. 379 –
by Gundel 1936, 124–125; Graßhoff 1990, 69–70.
162 Martina Savio
reasons, the same sources themselves clearly indicate – as we have seen – the
practical-applied benefit of such knowledge, above all in terms of calendars and
parapegmata and for telling and recording the time. Indeed, it is precisely these
practical functions that some authors explicitly indicate as one of the primary
reasons why their own instruction is important. The knowledge of the name,
form, and position of the constellations evidently formed part of the potential
‘cultural baggage’ of individuals of a (middling to?) high socio-cultural level,
and was also perceived, at least in some contexts, not only as a pure ‘intellectual
enrichment’, but also (and sometimes perhaps even primarily) as an instrument
of practical life (cf. esp. Polyb. 9.15), a means of using the night sky as a ‘calendar’
and ‘clock’.
Appendix to note 61: main Greek astronomical papyri related to calendrical-chron-

ological applications published to date
P.Hib. 1 27 Ro (ca. 300 B.C., text probably composed in the Saite nome), a para
pegma in ‘discursive’ form, which reports for each moment of the year of the
Egyptian calendar, among other astronomical-meteorological data, the length of
the daytime and of the night, the religious festivals, and the ‘salient’ moments of
the phenomenal cycle of the Nile: see Neugebauer 1975, 599–600, 687–689, 706;
Fowler/Turner 1983; Lehoux 2007, 22–27 passim, 153–154, 217–223; Jones 2009,
343–346; Del Corso 2016, 277–280.
P.Petrie 3 134 (3rd cent. B.C., from Gurob), containing reference to the 36 ‘decans’,
which were both ten-day units of the Egyptian calendar and also constellations
that from the Ptolemaic era onward were ‘assimilated’ to the zodiacal band (three
decans for each sign). Their cycles of visibility were used in the Egyptian tradition
both to define the ‘astronomical-seasonal’ rhythm of annual time and to establish
the time at night (according to a simple and approximate mechanism, similar to
that mentioned by Aratus: see above). It also contains a reference to the three
months of the Egyptian calendar, Thoth, Tybi, and Pachons, that mark the start
of the three seasons into which the calendar was divided, associated with the
mention of religious celebrations (ἑορταί): see the edition of Mahaffy 1905, 323;
Neugebauer 1962a, 387 (nr. 31); Jones 2009, 345.
P.Ryl. 4 589 (180 B.C., assigned to Philadelphia on the basis of various internal ele-
ments), which, on the recto and following an account, bears (written by another
hand) a sort of ‘luni-solar parapegma’ with the list of dates of the Egyptian calen-
dar of each new Moon, calculated on the basis of a cycle of 25 years = 309 lunar
months = 9125 days. This is introduced by the presentation and explanation of the
arithmetical-astronomical assumptions of the calculation scheme according to

such a cycle and by the indication of the ‘prevalent’ zodiacal position of the Sun
for each month of the Egyptian calendar (one sign for each month). This is also
accompanied by reference to at least some festivals connected to Greek divinities:
see Turner/Neugebauer 1949; Neugebauer 1975, 600; Lehoux 2007, 179–180; Jones
2009, 344–345; cf. the list of dates of the Egyptian calendar for the full Moons in
one year in P.Mich. 3 150 of the 3rd–4th cent. A.D., perhaps from Oxyrhynchus
(Delporte 1947).
P.Vindob. inv. Graec. 1 (Institut für Österr. Geschichtsforschung Pap. Graec. Nr. 1), it
too assigned to the Fayum, and datable to the 3rd–2nd cent. B.C., which contains
a brief description of the planets with the datum of the period of sidereal/zodia-
cal revolution for each, a ‘list’ of meteorological σημεῖα, which can be placed in
the same tradition of materials that have in various ways flowed into the meteoro-
logical section of Aratus’ poem and into the De signis attributed to Theophrastus,
and a shadow table: see Wessely 1900; Neugebauer 1962b; Arrighetti 1963; Martin
1998, cxv–cxxiii; Sider 2007, 15.
P.Ryl. 3 522+523 (3rd – or perhaps early 4th – cent. A.D.), a folio of a codex (or final
fragment of an opisthograph roll) with a table of the rising times of each degree
of sign of the zodiacal circle (the fragment preserves only the section concerning
Pisces), for three of the ‘traditional’ seven κλίματα (considered and proposed also
by Ptolemy, but certainly of older origin) on the recto and a table/list of important
cities with the value of the latitude and longitude for each city on the verso (see
Defaux 2020 and the studies cited and discussed there).
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TC 2022; 14(1): 139–167

Keywords: Star ‘catalogues’, astronomical popularization, time reckoning.

*Corresponding author: Martina Savio, Università di Genova, Genova, Italia,

English translation by Orla Mulholland.

poetic-literary dimension,6 the sources nonetheless clearly document that the

On the latter, Hipparchus makes specific reference to the abundance of commen-

The widespread use of the text of Aratus as an ‘elementary astronomical

reflections on specific scientific content include, as a preliminary and/or supple-

doxographic in tone, to astronomical-cosmological knowledge.34 While it relies

34 On the doxographic-didactic nature of the work of Achilles see in particular Mansfeld/Runia

43 As well as the expository structure of the surviving catalogic-astronomical sources, a reflex

Another element that is organically connected to this catalogic-didactic

As regards Hipparchus’ work, the sources taken as whole, especially Ptolemy

catalogue extract relating to the three circumpolar constellations of Ursa Major,

54 Cf. Neugebauer 1975, 288–291.

of popularization60 as absolute measures of time, in various ways on the basis of

in primis in the study of the geometric-kinematic correlation between the posi-

vation.72 Hipparchus (2.2–3.4) provides information that is in part analogous to

In conclusion, the complex of data provided by the sources concerning writings

Appendix to note 61: main Greek astronomical papyri related to calendrical-chron-

arithmetical-astronomical assumptions of the calculation scheme according to

Baplu, N. (2008), “Lists of months in Greek papyri”, in: CE 83, 224–244.

Gibbs, S.L. (1976), Greek and Roman sundials, New Haven-London.

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