Ephemeral Events: English Broadsides of Early Eighteenth-Century Solar Eclipses

On public science in eighteenth-century England, see Stewart Larry , The rise of public science: Rhetoric, technology, and natural philosophy in Newtonian Britain, 1660–1750 (Cambridge, 1992), and Golinski Jan , Science as public culture: Chemistry and enlightenment in Britain, 1760–1820 (Cambridge, 1992).

On public lectures, private consumption, and science in eighteenth-century England, see (among other works) Stewart , op. cit. (ref 1), esp. Part II; Golinski , op. cit. (ref. 1), esp. chap. 2; Morton Alan Q. Wess Jane A. , Public & private science: The King George III Collection (Oxford, 1993); The British journal for the history of science, xxviii/1 (1995), which is devoted to scientific lecturing; Schaffer Simon , “The consuming flame: Electrical showmen and Tory mystics in the world of goods”, in Brewer John Porter Roy (eds), Consumption and the world of goods (London, 1993), 489–526; Morton A. Q. , “Lectures on natural philosophy in London: 1750–1765: S. C. T. Demainbray (1710–1782) and the ‘Inattention’ of his countrymen”, The British journal for the history of science, xxiii (1990), 411–34; Schaffer Simon , “Natural philosophy and public spectacle in the eighteenth century”, History of science, xxi (1983), 1–43; Porter Roy , “Science, provincial culture, and public opinion in Enlightenment England”, British journal for eighteenth-century studies, iii (1980), 20–46; Heilbron J. L. , Electricity in the 17th & 18th centuries (Berkeley, 1979); Fara Patricia , Sympathetic attractions: Magnetic practices, beliefs, and symbolism in eighteenth-century England (Princeton, 1996); Walters Alice N. , “Conversation pieces: Science and politeness in eighteenth-century England”, History of science, xxxv (1997), 121–54; Secord James A. , “Newton in the nursery: Tom Telescope and the philosophy of tops and balls, 1761–1838”, History of science, xxiii (1985), 127–51; Porter Roy Schaffer Simon Bennett Jim Brown Olivia , Science and profit in eighteenth-century London (Cambridge, 1985); Millburn John R. , Benjamin Martin: Author, instrument maker, and ‘country showman’ (Leyden, 1976); and idem, Wheelwright of the heavens: The life and work of James Ferguson, FRS (London, 1988). The cultural context within which science was commercialized is illuminated in Brewer John , The pleasures of the imagination: English culture in the eighteenth century (New York, 1997).

On the special place occupied by astronomy among the sciences consumed by the public, see Walters , op. cit. (ref. 2), 125–6.

On astrology in late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century England, see Curry Patrick , Prophecy and power (Princeton, 1989); Capp Bernard , English almanacs, 1500–1800: Astrology and the popular press (Ithaca, 1979); Thomas Keith , Religion and the decline of magic (New York, 1971); and the essays in Curry Patrick (ed.), Astrology, science, and society: Historical essays (Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1987). On the astronomy of comets, and their interpretation, see Genuth Sara Schechner , Comets, popular culture, and the birth of modern cosmology (Princeton, 1997). On prodigies and their interpretation in the early eighteenth century, see Burns William E. , “An age of wonders: Prodigies in Restoration culture”, unpublished typescript, esp. chap. 5. The challenges presented to natural philosophers by a similarly unusual event — The aurora — Are detailed in Fara Patricia , “Lord Derwentwater's Lights: Prediction and the aurora polaris”, Journal for the history of astronomy, xxvii (1996), 239–58.

The True Figure of that Great Eclipse of the Sun… September 13, 1699. Houghton Library, Harvard University.

The history of astrological and astronomical broadsides from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century is addressed by Véron P. Tammann G. A. , “Astronomical broadsheets and their scientific significance”, Endeavour, n.s., iii (1979), 163–70; and Gingerich Owen , “Eighteenth-century eclipse paths”, Sky and telescope, lxii (1981), 324–7, reprinted in his The great Copernicus chase and other adventures in astronomical history (Cambridge, 1992), 153–6. A recent book surveys the development of eclipse maps in eighteenth-century England, including several of the prints discussed here: Armitage Geoff , The shadow of the Moon: British solar eclipse mapping in the eighteenth century (Tring, 1997). On English astrological ephemera, see Thomas , op. cit. (ref. 4), 298–300.

Examples of eighteenth-century astronomical broadsides, including those illustrated here, may be found in the following collections: The Oxford Museum of the History of Science (OMHS); the Whipple Museum of the History of Science, Cambridge (WMHS); the Prints Collection of the Science Museum Library, London (SML); the Map Collection of the British Library; the archives of the Royal Astronomical Society, London (RAS); the History of Astronomy Collection of The Adler Planetarium, Chicago; and the Houghton Library at Harvard University (Harvard). The latter collection is dominated by broadsides acquired by Narcissus Luttrell (1657–1732), a collector of ephemera, who conveniently noted on his broadsides both the date he purchased an item and its price.

On the value of curiosity and curiosities in the eighteenth century, see Benedict Barbara M. , “The ‘curious attitude’ in eighteenth-century Britain: Observing and owning”, Eighteenth-century life, xiv (1990), 59–98. Benedict particularly notes that “curiosity” signified, among other things, scientific learning and scientific collecting: See esp. pp. 59–60, 78–82.

In 1680, the Royal Society entertained a proposal to publish “philosophical gazettes”, costing no more than 2d, that would have “contrasted with the rather bulkier and more expensive format of the Philosophical transactions“. However, the idea was abandoned. See Hunter Michael Wood Paul B. , “Towards Solomon's House: Rival strategies for reforming the early Royal Society”, History of science, xxiv (1986), 49–108, esp. p. 59 (quote).

On Senex, see Taylor E. G. R. , Mathematical practitioners of Hanoverian England, 1714–1840 (Cambridge, 1966), 143; Tyacke Sarah , London map-sellers, 1660–1720 (Tring, Hertfordshire, 1978), 142; and Wallis R. V. Wallis P. J. , Biobibliography of British mathematicians, Part II (Newcastle upon Tyne, 1986), 21. Senex's role as a scientific entrepreneur is illuminated in Stewart, op. cit. (ref. 1), esp. pp. 95, 147, 173, 187, 190. The scientific and popular role of one of Senex's prints — William Whiston's Transits of Venus and Mercury over the Sun (1723) — Is discussed in Woolf Harry , The transits of Venus (Princeton, 1959), 28–29.

The standard work on Martin is Millburn, Martin (ref. 2), which together with two subsequent works by Millburn, Benjamin Martin: Supplement (London, 1986) and Retailer of the sciences: Benjamin Martin's scientific instrument catalogues, 1756–1782 (London, 1986), provides a detailed portrait of this important figure in the dissemination and commercialization of science in eighteenth-century Britain.

This survey is based on a list of maps and prints included in Millburn , Martin (ref. 2), 208. Millburn lists nine prints, of which all but one, A map of 20 miles round London, are certainly astronomical. I have examined copies of six of these prints.

Aside from the lists of the prints published by Senex and Martin cited above, no comprehensive catalogue of eighteenth-century astronomical broadsides has been published. Since they present particular difficulties for the bibliographer, they are often hard to find; see, for example, the comments of Marjorie Hope Nicolson and G. S. Rousseau concerning their attempt to trace William Whiston's Scheme of the solar system in “This long disease my life”: Alexander Pope and the sciences (Princeton, 1968), 147–8. More recently, the difficulties of locating often uncatalogued prints have been made evident by the Wallis's very useful Biobibliography of British mathematics (ref. 10), which includes those of Leadbetter (p. 85), Smith (p. 224), Witchell (p. 269), and Betts (p. 304), and some of Martin's (pp. 212–16), but which has missed several prints, often only initialled or anonymous. For insight into the challenges of locating and cataloguing such material, see Alston R. C. , “The eighteenth-century non-book: Observations on printed ephemera”, in Barber Giles Fabian Bernhard (eds), Buch und Buchhandel in Europa im achtzehnten Jahrhundert (Hamburg, 1981), 343–60.

Halley Edmond , “Observations of the late Total Eclipse of the Sun on the 22d of April last past…”, Philosophical transactions, xxix (1714–16), 245–62, p. 261.

These placements for the paths of totality are based on Benjamin Martin's map, The passage of the dark shadow of the Moon over England & other parts of Europe in the five great solar eclipses of the century (OMHS). Almost certainly this is the map cited in Millburn, Martin (ref. 2), 208, as An accurate map of 460 miles round London, which was advertised in 1758.

On Harris's Astronomical dialogues, see Walters , op. cit. (ref. 2), 133.

On Moore's work, see Willmoth Frances , Sir Jonas Moore: Practical mathematics and Restoration science (Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1993), 195–207.

The first advertisement appeared in the London Gazette on 8–12 March; both advertisements are quoted in Tyacke, op. cit. (ref. 10), 103.

Whiston William , Astronomical lectures, read in the publick schools at Cambridge (London, 1715). Farrell Maureen , William Whiston (New York, 1981), 191–8, outlines the contents of the work, which was based on lectures originally given at Cambridge University between 1701 and 1703, and which was published in Latin in 1707.

Halley Edmond , A Description of the Passage of the Shadow of the Moon over England, In the Total Eclipse of the SUN, on the 22d Day of April 1715 in the Morning , Harvard. Luttrell's copy is dated 10 April, but it was likely published in March. On advertising in the scientific instrument and book trades, Crawforth M. A. , “Evidence from trade cards for the scientific instrument industry”, Annals of science, xlii (1985), 453–554; Walters Alice , “Tools of enlightenment: The material culture of science in eighteenth-century England”, Ph.D. dissertation, University of California Berkeley, 1992, chap. 3.

Halley , op. cit. (ref. 20). Copies of this print are at the RAS, WMHS, and Harvard; Harvard's copy lists the price (in ms). The map is reproduced and discussed in Gingerich, op. cit. (ref. 6), 324; Armtiage , op. cit. (ref. 6), frontispiece, 6–9; Thrower Norman J. W. , “Edmond Halley and thematic geo-cartography”, in Thrower (ed.), The compleat plattmaker (Berkeley, 1978), 195–228, pp. 225–7; Shirley Rodney W. , Printed maps of the British Isles, 1650–1750 (London, 1988), 126–7; and Chapman Allan , “Edmond Halley's use of historical evidence in the advancement of science”, Notes and records of the Royal Society of London, xlviii (1994), 167–91.

Rogers Nicholas , “Popular protest in early Hanoverian London”, Past and present, no. 79 (1978), 70–100, esp. pp. 71–73; Stewart , op. cit. (ref. 1), 134.

Halley , op. cit. (ref. 20). See also Chapman , op. cit. (ref. 21), 183.

W. W., The eclipse. A poem, in commemoration of the Total eclipse of the Sun, April 22, 1715 (London, 1715), 8. On other interpretations of the 1715 eclipse, see Burns , op. cit. (ref. 4), and Curry , op. cit. (ref. 4), 119–20; on the importance of such events in popular astrology, Curry , ibid. , 97. On similar astrological interpretations of the solar eclipse of 1652 (called “Black Monday” by contemporaries), see Thomas , op. cit. (ref. 4), 299–300; and Burns William E. , “‘The terriblest eclipse that hath been seen in our days:’ Black Monday and the debate on astrology during the interregnum”, in Osler Margaret J. (ed.), The canonical imperative: Rethinking the Scientific Revolution , forthcoming. For a different perspective on the motivations of “elite writers” to “dismiss … interpretations of providential intervention as superstition”, see Fara , op. cit. (ref. 4), 242.

Speculum mundi: Or, An exact account of the great and formidable eclipse of the Sun, which will be visible, total, and central, in England, May 11, 1724. (London, 1723), 20.

Halley , op. cit. (ref. 20).

Halley , op. cit. (ref. 14), 245. See also Ronan Colin A. , Edmond Halley: Genius in eclipse (Garden City, N.Y., 1969), 196–7.

Halley took a similar approach to the aurorae of 1716, though without using the broadside as a publication medium; Fara, op. cit. (ref. 4), 240–6.

Weatherill Lorna , Consumer behaviour and material culture in Britain, 1660–1760 (London, 1988), esp. pp. 3–4, 26–27, 88, 168, 180. See also Morton Wess , op. cit. (ref. 2), 47–48.

Halley , op. cit. (ref. 14), 254. John Flamsteed similarly bemoaned the poor equipment available, to a correspondent in Northamptonshire. In a letter to Dr Hill of Peterborough, dated 28 April 1715, and sent to thank him for the eclipse data he had sent to the Royal Observatory, Flamsteed wrote, “I could wish you have been furnisht with a good Pendulum clock for observeing the times more exactly and better instruments then a sun diall…”. Flamsteed Correspondence, Cambridge University Library (RGO 1/36, f. 88–89). I am most grateful to Frances Willmoth, editor of Flamsteed's correspondence, for cheerfully deciphering his handwriting and sending me a copy of this letter.

Halley , op. cit. (ref. 14), 261–2; 255. See also Chapman , op. cit. (ref. 21), 185.

Halley Edmond , A Description of the Passage of the Shadow of the Moon over England as it was Observed in the late Total Eclipse of the SUN April 22d 1715 , Harvard; also reproduced in Gingerich, op. cit. (ref. 6), 325; another copy is illustrated in Armitage, op. cit. (ref. 6), 11. The print is dated in ms. 1 September 1715.

Halley Edmond , A Description of the Passage of the Shadow of the Moon over England In the Total Eclipse of the Sun on the 11^th day of May 1724 in the Evening. Togather with the Passage of the Shadow as it was Observed in the last Total Eclipse of 1715, Harvard. The print also makes note of Senex's new business address, “in Salisbury Court near Fleetstreet”. It is dated in ms. 5 November 1723. See also Armitage , op. cit. (ref. 6), 23.

Halley Edmond , A Description of the passage of the Shadow of the Moon over Europe, as it may be expected May 11th 1724 in the Evening, WMHS and Harvard.

Gingerich , op. cit. (ref. 6), 324.

Gingerich , op. cit. (ref. 6), 324 (quote). A modern calculation of the path of the 1724 eclipse shows that its limits were in fact located “about midway” between those established by Halley Whiston : ibid, 325.

Westfall Richard S. , Never at rest (Cambridge, 1980), 649–53. Schechner Genuth comments on religion and its impact on the relationship between Halley Whiston , op. cit. (ref. 4), 192–3.

Stewart , op. cit. (ref. 1), 77–97.

Genuth Schechner , op. cit. (ref. 4), 173. On Halley's moderately-Tory politics, see Burns , op. cit. (ref. 4); and Jacob Margaret C. , Scientific culture and the making of the industrial West (New York, 1997), 69–70.

Whiston William , Memoirs, i (London, 1749), 222. The print is discussed in Farrell, op. cit. (ref. 19), 230–2, while its impact on Pope is noted in Nicolson Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 13), 147–8.

The first notes that Senex is “now Engraving and will speedily Publish a most correct Pair of Globes of about 30 Inches Dter. at a moderate price & for which none are desir'd to advance yr money beforehand”; the second edition reads “(Senex) has just finished in a most Elegant manner a pair of 28 Inches diamr. fitt to adorn Publick Librarys and the Library's of the most curious”. It is very difficult to determine when these globes became available; they were still being advertised as “now Engraving” c. 1714, and were advertised as “now finish'd” in 1729. Copies of both of these prints are in the OMHS.

Copies of both the Bowles and Sayer edition of Whiston's Scheme and the West edition of The Newtonian System are in the Houghton Library at Harvard.

On the economics of copper-plate engraving in the globe industry, Bryden D. J. , “Cartography by subscription: An unsuccessful 18th century project to issue globes”, Revista da Universidade de Coimbra, xxvii (1979), 281–91, esp. pp. 290–1; and van der Krogt Peter , “Seventeenth century Dutch globes: Navigational instruments?”, Der Globusfreund, nos. 38/39 (1990), 67–76, esp. pp. 70–71.

On Bowles and Sayer, see Maxted Ian , The London book trades 1775–1800: A preliminary checklist (Folkestone, 1977), 26 and 199, resp. A good discussion of the print trade can be found in Brewer, op. cit. (ref. 2), esp. chap. 11.

These lectures, and responses to them, are discussed in Nicolson Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 13), 138–66; and in Rousseau G. S. , ‘“Wicked Whiston’ and the Scriblerians: Another Ancients-Modern controversy”, Studies in eighteenth-century culture, xvii (1987), 22–37. See also Loftis John , “Richard Steele's Censorium”, Huntington Library quarterly, xiv (1950), 59–60.

Whiston William , A Scheme of the Solar System with the Orbits of the Planets and Comets Belonging thereto.

Genuth Schechner , op. cit. (ref. 4), 162–8, 189–95; Nicolson Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 13), 139–40, 173–4; Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 45), 21–28.

Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 45), 28–29 (quote). In 1736, Whiston linked an increase in the incidence of meteors and northern lights seen since 1714 to the Hanoverian succession; Stewart, op. cit. (ref. 1), 71; Fara , op. cit. (ref. 4), 242–4. For the natural philosophical context of these kinds of interpretations, see Schaffer Simon , “Newton's comets and the transformation of astrology”, in Curry (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 4), 219–44. For the persistence of “high astrology” in the early eighteenth century, and Whiston's role in it, see Curry , op. cit. (ref. 4), chap. 6, esp. pp. 146–8.

Force James E. , William Whiston, honest Newtonian (Cambridge, 1985), 190, n. 74; Burns , op. cit. (ref. 4); on the 1715 eclipse specifically, Nicolson Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 13), 156–61; Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 45), 28.

Whiston William , op. cit. (ref. 40), 240. The passage continues: “As I look upon the numerous and remarkable Eclipses of the Astronomical Year 1736, to be the like divine Signals of the End of all Shadow of Persecution there.” For another comparison of Halley's and Whiston's disparate approaches to the interpretation of natural events, see Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 45), esp. p. 17.

Whiston William , A Calculation of the Great Eclipse of the Sun, April 22 1715 in the Morning, from Mr. Flamsteed's Tables, as corrected according to Sir Isaac Newton's Theory of the Moon in the Astronomical Lectures, with its Construction for London, Rome, and Stockholme , WMHS, Harvard (which lists the price in ms.); and A Compleat Account of the great Eclipse of the Sun which will happen April 22 in the Morning, SML, item 1986–358.

Whiston , Calculation (ref. 51). Though the eclipse occurred just prior to the resolution of the controversy over the unauthorized publication of Flamsteed's Historia coelestis (for which Newton and Halley were chiefly responsible), the acrimony does not seem to have tainted this literature. For an account of the dispute, see Westfall , op. cit. (ref. 32), 686–96.

Whiston described this instrument in a pamphlet published the same year: Whiston William , The Copernicus Explain 'd: Or a Brief Account of the Nature and Use of an Universal Astronomical Instrument… (London, 1715). According to this pamphlet, the instrument was composed of a nine-inch terrestrial globe mounted in several nested rings, to account for the motions of the Earth, Moon, and planets. It was made by Senex, and sold by him and Whiston for six guineas; Farrell , op. cit. (ref. 19), 214–17; Nicolson Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 13), 158–60; Whiston , op. cit. (ref. 40), 181–2, 241.

[ Flamsteed John ], Figure of the Eclipse of the Sun, that will happen April 22 1715 in the Morning. Shewing how it will appear at London and in the places adjacent, at any time during its whole continuance. Deduced from his own Tables, Harvard. The print sold for sixpence. As it was produced by Flamsteed's assistant, Joseph Crosthwait, and Gerard Van de Gucht, an engraver who later worked on the maps for Flamsteed's Atlas coelestis, the print was probably published with Flamsteed's knowledge and permission, though perhaps not at his instigation; Frances Willmoth, personal correspondence. See also Armitage , op. cit. (ref. 6), 13.

Whiston , Compleat Account (ref. 51).

Whiston , Compleat Account (ref. 51). A letter to Whiston from Richard Allin of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, providing an account of the eclipse, is quoted in Farrell , op. cit. (ref. 19), 219–20; although Allin does not specifically mention either of Whiston's prints, he does record that those with whom he observed the eclipse were able to see Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury, and one or two stars, but not the “sun's Milky Way” or any evidence of a lunar atmosphere. Whiston noted in his Memoirs that he subsequently published an “Account of that [the eclipse of 1715] and of the next total Eclipse of the Sun, May 11, 1724”; Whiston , op. cit. (ref. 40), 238–9. I have not located such a print, but, as should be evident by now, that does not mean it was not published or has not survived.

The Method of the Observations to be made at the Solar Eclipse, April 22d, 1715, Harvard (price noted in ms.).

Since Whiston does not address the differences in his two published predictions, it is difficult to say why his first prediction differed so much from his second or from those of Halley and Flamsteed. However, the astronomical data provided in the Calculation differ from that in the Compleat Account, which suggests that the new prediction in the latter was based on updated data. See also Armitage , op. cit. (ref. 6), 12; and Whiston , op. cit. (ref. 40), 239.

Whiston , op. cit. (ref. 40), 239; also quoted in Farrell, op. cit. (ref. 19), 213.

Westfall , op. cit. (ref. 32), 206; Heilbron , op. cit. (ref. 2), 153.

This estimate is based on the common-sense assumption that Whiston would have charged more for a single lecture than for a lecture course; at the time of the 1715 eclipse, Whiston and his partner Francis Hauksbee charged 3 guineas for a course of 28 lectures, or about 2 shillings 3 pence per lecture. It appears that 5 shillings was a standard charge for a single-evening event at the Censorium, a theatre run by one of Whiston's patrons, Richard Steele, which also hosted other lectures by Loftis Whiston , op. cit. (ref. 45); Farrell , op. cit. (ref. 19), 207–14.

The fact that Senex's stock at his death included copies of Whiston's two 1715 prints strongly suggests that he published it, and acted as its wholesale distributor. As the engraver of the two prints, he had some stake in the original copyright, so he probably paid Whiston for his share of this copyright. A good place to start for an introduction to the complexities of early-eighteenth century copyrights is Feather John , A history of British publishing (London, 1988), esp. chap. 6.

Whiston William , The Transit of the Total Shadow of the Moon over Europe in the Eclipse of the Sun May 11th 1724 in the Evening, described by Will. Whiston M.A. , Harvard. The print is dated by Whiston 27 April 1724. See also Armitage , op. cit. (ref. 6), 13–14; and Whiston William , The calculation of solar eclipses without parallaxes. With a specimen of the same in the total eclipse of the Sun, May 11, 1724 (London, 1724), which is discussed in Farrell, op. cit. (ref. 19), 225–6. The work sold for 1 shilling 6 pence. Whiston later complained “This Book has so many Mistakes, that 'till they are corrected, I do not desire to have it spread abroad any longer”. Whiston , op. cit. (ref. 40), 315. On the other publications he lists, see Fara , op. cit. (ref. 4), 251; and Farrell , op. cit. (ref. 19), 160–1, 220–3.

Eclipse races, (Addressed to the LADIES): Being an impartial account of the celestial coursers and their riders… (London, 1764). It was almost certainly written by Robert Heath, who also produced a more conventional pamphlet — With map — Detailing the eclipse, A General and Particular Account of the Annular Eclipse of the Sun… (London, 1764). Copies of both are in the OMHS. Heath's competitors included George Witchell, Benjamin Martin, and Joseph Betts, among others.

Walters , op. cit. (ref. 2), 146.