Historical Transit of Mercury
Submitted by jay on Sat, 2006-11-04 10:40.
The first confirmed human observation of a Transit of Mercury occurred November 7th 1631 after being predicted by Johannes Kepler just 4 years before that. Pierre Gassendi waited patiently in Paris and after almost giving up, successfully observed Mercury cross the sun. Transits of Mercury were then observed in 1651, 1661 and then on Novmber 7th 1677, Sir Edmund Halley became the first astronomer to ever observe the complete passage of Mercury across the solar disc.
In 1742 Johann Gabriel Doppelmayer published the Atlas Coelestis, a truly remarkable work of astronomical illustration. Plate 7 of the work includes a small illustration of the path of Mercury across the sun during the Transit of 1710:
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