total lunar eclipse A lunar eclipse is an astronomical event that occurs when the Moon moves into the Earth's shadow, causing the Moon to be darkened. Such an alignment occurs during an eclipse season, approximately every six months, during the full moon pha ...

occurred on 1 March 1504, visible at sunset for the Americas, and later over night over Europe and Africa, and near sunrise over Asia. During his fourth and last voyage,

Christopher Columbus Christopher Columbus (; between 25 August and 31 October 1451 – 20 May 1506) was an Italians, Italian explorer and navigator from the Republic of Genoa who completed Voyages of Christopher Columbus, four Spanish-based voyages across the At ...

induced the inhabitants of

Jamaica Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...

to continue provisioning him and his hungry men, successfully intimidating them by correctly predicting a total

lunar eclipse A lunar eclipse is an astronomical event that occurs when the Moon moves into the Earth's shadow, causing the Moon to be darkened. Such an alignment occurs during an eclipse season, approximately every six months, during the full moon phase, ...

for 1 March 1504 (visible on the evening of 29 February in the Americas). Some have claimed that Columbus used the ''

Ephemeris In astronomy and celestial navigation, an ephemeris (; ; , ) is a book with tables that gives the trajectory of naturally occurring astronomical objects and artificial satellites in the sky, i.e., the position (and possibly velocity) over tim ...

'' of the German astronomer

Regiomontanus Johannes Müller von Königsberg (6 June 1436 – 6 July 1476), better known as Regiomontanus (), was a mathematician, astrologer and astronomer of the German Renaissance, active in Vienna, Buda and Nuremberg. His contributions were instrument ...

, but Columbus himself attributed the prediction to the ''Almanach'' by

Abraham Zacuto Abraham Zacuto (, ; 12 August 1452 – ) was a Sephardic Jewish astronomer, astrologer, mathematician, rabbi and historian. Born in Castile, he served as Royal Astronomer to King John II of Portugal before fleeing to Tunis. His astrolabe of cop ...

Visibility

''The eclipse was visible after sunset on 29 February from most of North America, all of South America, as well as across Europe, Africa, and western Asia on the morning of 1 March.''

Observations

On 30 June 1503,

beached his two last

caravel The caravel (Portuguese language, Portuguese: , ) is a small sailing ship developed by the Portuguese that may be rigged with just lateen sails, or with a combination of lateen and Square rig, square sails. It was known for its agility and s ...

s and was stranded in

. The

indigenous people There is no generally accepted definition of Indigenous peoples, although in the 21st century the focus has been on self-identification, cultural difference from other groups in a state, a special relationship with their traditional territ ...

of the island welcomed Columbus and his crew and fed them, but after six months, they halted the food supply, dissatisfied with what the Spaniards could provide in trade. Columbus had on board an

almanac An almanac (also spelled almanack and almanach) is a regularly published listing of a set of current information about one or multiple subjects. It includes information like weather forecasting, weather forecasts, farmers' sowing, planting dates ...

authored by

astronomical Astronomy is a natural science that studies celestial objects and the phenomena that occur in the cosmos. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and their overall evolution. Objects of interest include ...

tables covering the years 1475–1506. Upon consulting the book, he noticed the date and the time of an upcoming lunar eclipse. He was able to use this information to his advantage. He requested a meeting for that day with the

cacique A cacique, sometimes spelled as cazique (; ; feminine form: ), was a tribal chieftain of the Taíno people, who were the Indigenous inhabitants of the Bahamas, the Greater Antilles, and the northern Lesser Antilles at the time of European cont ...

, the leader, and told him that

God In monotheistic belief systems, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. In polytheistic belief systems, a god is "a spirit or being believed to have created, or for controlling some part of the un ...

was angry with the local people's treatment of Columbus and his men. Columbus said God would provide a clear sign of displeasure by making the rising full Moon appear "inflamed with wrath". The lunar eclipse and the red Moon appeared on schedule, and the indigenous people were impressed and frightened. The son of Columbus, Ferdinand, wrote that the people: Columbus went into his cabin, ostensibly to pray, and timed the eclipse with his

hourglass An hourglass (or sandglass, sand timer, or sand clock) is a device used to measure the passage of time. It comprises two glass bulbs connected vertically by a narrow neck that allows a regulated flow of a substance (historically sand) from the ...

. Shortly before the totality ended after 48 minutes, he told the frightened indigenous people that they were going to be forgiven. When the Moon started to reappear from the shadow of the Earth, he told them that God had pardoned them.

Longitude

Columbus was perhaps the first to put into practice an idea proposed by

Hipparchus Hipparchus (; , ; BC) was a Ancient Greek astronomy, Greek astronomer, geographer, and mathematician. He is considered the founder of trigonometry, but is most famous for his incidental discovery of the precession of the equinoxes. Hippar ...

, to use a lunar eclipse to determine one's geographical longitude. A lunar eclipse is visible across half the globe, and everyone sees it begin and end at the same moment. But the times when measured in the local solar time will differ, because everyone is in a different time zone. The local time is determined by observing the rise, culmination, or setting of the Sun. Now an almanac will predict an eclipse for some place at a certain geographical longitude at a specific local time there. The same event observed elsewhere will occur at a different clocktime. The difference in time is proportional to the difference in geographical longitude, by 15 degrees per hour. Columbus had no accurate means to determine how far he had travelled west on the globe. He observed the lunar eclipses of 15 September 1494 near

Hispaniola Hispaniola (, also ) is an island between Geography of Cuba, Cuba and Geography of Puerto Rico, Puerto Rico in the Greater Antilles of the Caribbean. Hispaniola is the most populous island in the West Indies, and the second-largest by List of C ...

(

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles of the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean. It shares a Maritime boundary, maritime border with Puerto Rico to the east and ...

), and that of 29 February 1504 from

. In the latter case he reported in his journal that Jamaica was 7 hours and 15 minutes from Cadiz in Spain - well on his way to China. However his site at Jamaica is actually at a longitude 4 hours 44 minutes from Cadiz. How Columbus could make such a large error of 2 hours remains puzzling, but D.W. Olson proposed a reconstruction. Columbus presumably used the Calendarium from

. This almanac gives the time of mid-eclipse at

Nuremberg Nuremberg (, ; ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the Franconia#Towns and cities, largest city in Franconia, the List of cities in Bavaria by population, second-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Bav ...

, but if Columbus erroneously interpreted the listed time as that of the beginning of the partial eclipse, then his 2h error could be explained. One can imagine that such false evidence confirmed Columbus in his belief he had reached China, overlooking the fact that he had reached a continent previously unknown to Europeans.

Fictional variations

H. Rider Haggard used an altered version of the real story of the rescue of Columbus in his novel ''

King Solomon's Mines ''King Solomon's Mines'' is an 1885 popular fiction, popular novel by the English Victorian literature, Victorian adventure writer and fable, fabulist Sir H. Rider Haggard. Published by Cassell and Company, it tells of an expedition through an ...

'' (first published 1885), where hero Allan Quatermain and his companions recruit supporters for their cause from the local tribe by predicting a

. (In early editions, this was a solar eclipse; Haggard changed it after realising that his description of a solar eclipse was not realistic.) In Mark Twain's 1889 novel, ''

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court ''A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court'' is an 1889 historical novel by American humorist and writer Mark Twain. The book was originally titled ''A Yankee in King Arthur's Court''. Some early editions are titled ''A Yankee at the Court ...

'', the protagonist, Hank Morgan, a time-travelling 19th-century resident of

Hartford, Connecticut Hartford is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. The city, located in Hartford County, Connecticut, Hartford County, had a population of 121,054 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 ce ...

, escapes being burned at the stake by predicting a

solar eclipse A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby obscuring the view of the Sun from a small part of Earth, totally or partially. Such an alignment occurs approximately every six months, during the eclipse season i ...

early medieval England Anglo-Saxon England or early medieval England covers the period from the end of Roman imperial rule in Britain in the 5th century until the Norman Conquest in 1066. Compared to modern England, the territory of the Anglo-Saxons stretched nort ...

during the time of the legendary

King Arthur According to legends, King Arthur (; ; ; ) was a king of Great Britain, Britain. He is a folk hero and a central figure in the medieval literary tradition known as the Matter of Britain. In Wales, Welsh sources, Arthur is portrayed as a le ...

Bolesław Prus Aleksander Głowacki (20 August 1847 – 19 May 1912), better known by his pen name Bolesław Prus (), was a Polish journalist, novelist, a leading figure in the history of Polish literature and philosophy, and a distinctive voice in world ...

' historical novel, ''

Pharaoh Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...

'', written in 1894–95, also uses this trope.

Christopher Kasparek Christopher Kasparek (born 1945) is a Scottish-born writer of Polish descent who has translated works by numerous Polish authors, including Ignacy Krasicki, Bolesław Prus, Florian Znaniecki, Władysław Tatarkiewicz, Marian Rejewski, and Wł ...

, "Prus' ''Pharaoh'' and the Solar Eclipse", ''

The Polish Review ''The Polish Review'' is an English-language academic journal published quarterly in New York City by the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences of America. ''The Polish Review'' was established in 1956, as a successor of the ''PAU Bulletin''. It ...

'', 1997, no. 4, pp. 471-78. A similar plot also features in ''

The Adventures of Tintin ''The Adventures of Tintin'' ( ) is a series of 24 comic albums created by Belgians, Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi, who wrote under the pen name Hergé. The series was one of the most popular European comics of the 20th century. By 2007, a c ...

'' comic, '' Prisoners of the Sun'', first published between 1946 and 1948. The Guatemalan writer Augusto Monterroso used a similar plot in his short novel ''El eclipse'', published in 1959 in ''Obras completas (y otros cuentos)'', but with an opposite ending, sarcastic and anticolonialist.

Notes

References

Lunar eclipses 1501-1600

NASA graphic

External links

Science News: The Eclipse That Saved Columbus, By Ivars Peterson

* ttp://starryskies.com/The_sky/events/lunar-2003/columbus.eclipse.html starryskies.com: Christopher Columbus and the Lunar Eclipse
www.wordinfo.info Christopher Columbus Survived by Using a Lunar Eclipse Trick
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lunar eclipse 1504-03 1504-03 1504 in science History of the Americas Christopher Columbus