John Flamsteed
Flamsteed, John
(flăm`stēd), 1646–1719, English astronomer. He was appointed (1675) astronomer royal by King Charles II and carried on his researches at Greenwich Observatory. Over his protests—he did not consider it ready for publication—the Historia Coelestis, which included the first of the Greenwich star catalogs, was published in 1712. His complete work, Historia Coelestis Britannica, finished after his death by his assistants, did not appear until 1725.Bibliography
See E. F. McPike, Hevelius, Flamsteed and Halley (1937).
Flamsteed, John
Born Aug. 19, 1646, in Denby; died Dec. 31, 1719, in Greenwich. English astronomer.
Flamsteed was the founder and first director of the Royal Greenwich Observatory. His observations resulted in a catalog of highly accurate positions for approximately 3,000 stars (Historia coelestis Britannica, vols. 1–3, 1712–25) and a star atlas (Atlas coelestis, 1729). Flamsteed made a large number of lunar observations, which were used by I. Newton in validating the law of universal gravitation.