Abstract
HARTWI'S COMET.—Prof. Winnecke, in a circular issued from Strassburg on October 5, expresses the opinion that it is highly probable the comet discovered by Dr. Hartwig on September 29 was observed in the year 1506, and at his request Dr. Hartwig has submitted the point to calculation, using the first approximation to the orbit which we gave last week. Laugier computed elements of the comet of 1506, from the rough accounts left by European chroniclers and one in the Chinese annals, but his places were necessarily very arbitrarily fixed in this case, as may be seen on referring to his communication presented to the Academy of Sciences at Paris on January 26, 1846. It has not been consequently from any striking similarity between the orbits that Prof. Winnecke has been led to conjecture the identity of the comets, but rather, it would appear, from a general resemblance of track, allowance being made for the somewhat later appearance in the year of the comet of 1880. The Chinese observations do certainly in some cases enable us to make reliable approximations to the orbits of comets, as, for instance, in 568 and 1337; indeed for the latter comet they furnish a remarkably good outline of its apparent path, considering the difficulties which in many cases attend the interpretation of the Chinese accounts: nevertheless for the great majority of comets recorded in their annals the descriptions are unfortunately totally insufficient for this purpose, one very common failing being the omission of dates corresponding to the positions given, as for the comet of A.D. 178, which must have passed very near the earth from the long track Lit described in the heavens.
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Our Astronomical Column . Nature 22, 569 (1880). https://doi.org/10.1038/022569a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/022569a0