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A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: Christopher Willmes
Date: 2020 Dec 28, 18:10 +0000
The invention of the telescope was a really big deal. And shortly after Galileo was making headlines in Italy for his numerous astronomical discoveries using his small telescope, the East India Company arranged a gift of a silver and gold telescope to the Shogun of Japan in the name of King James I of Great Britain.
Here's a description of the book from OUP:
https://blog.oup.com/2020/12/an-astronomically-good-deal-king-james-i-and-the-shoguns-silver-telescope/There's a recording of an enjoyable, informative recent web presentation on the book by the author, Timon Screech.
A quote from that presentation, describing the Jesuits in Japan and the impact that a telescope might have had on the Shogun: "All that astronomy they've been teaching you for the past fifty years... it's wrong. It's not only wrong... They know it's wrong." Bear in mind that a substantial portion of this is a speculative theory, but it is possible, even plausible, and given limited records from the era, that may be as good as it gets.
Frank Reed
