The 400-Year Rhythm of Great Conjunctions

 
“We have known for thousands of years that the sky is full of harmonies and rhythms. Pythagoras called it the ‘music of the spheres.’ Great conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn follow a number of such rhythms. The most obvious is the roughly 20-year gap between each conjunction, when the two giants appear close together on the sky. During this period, Saturn completes two-thirds of its 30-year orbit, while Jupiter completes one lap of its 12-year orbit plus two-thirds of its next one. The odd two-thirds of an orbit mean that successive conjunctions are separated in the sky by about 240 degrees. ...”

In 1606, Johannes Kepler showed how three successive conjunctions form a near-perfect triangle when plotted on the zodiacal circle.

No comments:

Post a Comment