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T r a n s i t o f Venus

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8th June 2004, 6th June 2012

Histrory of the Transit of Venus

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Who first predicted the Transit of Venus? Who observed it first ? Geographical Visibility of TOV 2004, June 7 Leading astronomers, scientists, explorers historical observations & global expeditions	1. Who first predicted the Transit of Venus? In 1627 the great mmore accurate tables of planetary movements which he named the Rudolphine Tables in honour of his old benefactor Rudolph II, and he was able to show that both Mercury and Venus would transit the Sun during the year 1631 - Mercury on 7 November and Venus on 6 December. By 1631 Kepler was dead, but the transit of Mercury was successfully observed by the French astronomer Pierre Gassendi.athematician Johannes Keeper finished what was destined to be his last work, a set of new and
	2. WHO OBSERVED IT FIRST ? From a study of Kepler's and other tables, corrected by his own observations made with a half-crown telescope, Horrocks predicted another transit of Venus at 3 p.m. on November 24 (O.S.), 1639, and forewarned his friend, William Crabtree. Adopting Gassendi's method, he projected the Sun's image on a circle divided round into degrees and, at 3.17 p.m. 'beheld a most agreeable spectacle…a spot of unusual magnitude and of perfectly circular shape which had wholly entered upon the Sun's disc to the left. Crabtree, at Broughton, near Manchester, was less fortunate, for the sky remained overcast all day, and only when the Sun was nearly on the horizon did the clouds break. Then, to his delight, he saw Venus silhouetted against the Sun and, according to Horrocks, was so taken aback by the spectacle that, by the time he had recovered himself, the clouds had again obscured the Sun. This was the first observation of transit of Venus.
	3. GEOGRAPHICAL VISIBILITY OF TOV 2004, JUNE 8 : The global visibility of the 2004 transit is illustrated with the world map (Low Res or High Res). The entire transit (all four contacts) is visible from Europe, Africa (except western parts), Middle East, and most of Asia ( except eastern parts). The Sun sets while the transit is still in progress from Australia, Indonesia, Japan, Philippines, Korea, easternmost China and Southeast Asia. Similarly, the Sun rises with the transit already in progress for observers in western Africa, eastern North America, the Caribbeans and most of South America None of the transit will be visible from southern Chile or Argentina, western North America, Hawaii or New Zealand. (http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov)
	4. NAMES OF LEADING ASTRONOMERS, SCIENTISTS, EXPLORERS IN ToV EVENTS IN LAST 500 YEARS : Johannes Kepler, Pierre Gassendi, Jeremiah Horrocks, William Crabtree, James Gregory, Edmond Halley, Mikhail Lomonosov, David Rittenhouse, Nevil Maskelyne, Robert Waddington, Charles Mason, Jeremiah Dixon, James Cook, Alexandre Pingre, Jaques Cassini, Simon Newcomb, Le Gentil de la Galaisiere, Bird, Nicolas Louis de Lacaille, Thomas Hornsby, Colonel J. F. Tennant, Rangnathachari and many others.
	6. HISTORICAL OBSERVATIONS & GLOBAL EXPEDITIONS : Transits of Venus : The Expeditions -by www.TransitofVenus.com