Who were the earliest astronomers?
We take a look at the people who took the first astronomical recordings
The Thirteen Towers of Chankillo, built in Peru to track the motion of the Sun, is the world’s oldest solar observatory and dates back as far as 400BCE
Asked by Brian Shane
The first recorded example of astronomy is around 3,500 years old and comes from Mesopotamia. Babylonian writings and star charts mapped out the sky, as well as making constant reference to the names of stars given to them by the Sumerians, suggests these people were probably observing the night sky back in the early Bronze Age.
Confirmation of the earliest astronomers is tricky to find, as we believe that people have always studied the sky in one way or another. Archaeologists have found solar observatories from 5,000BCE built in central Europe. These henges are designed to line up with the position of the Sun and sometimes the Moon at various times of the year, usually the seasonal solstices.
Answered by Josh Barker from the National Space Centre