
Oldest recorded solar eclipse helps date the Egyptian pharaohs - fanf2
http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/oldest-recorded-solar-eclipse-helps-date-the-egyptian-pharaohs
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lukasb
The paper is available (in HTML even) and much better:
[https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article/58/5/5.39/4159289/...](https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article/58/5/5.39/4159289/Solar-
eclipse-of-1207-BC-helps-to-
date?guestAccessKey=96454415-36e7-4640-9fde-d942f3ad00b4)

~~~
elliotec
Who says they didn’t get eye damage from it? Also, I have a feeling most
people I know have looked at the sun unprotected for at least some small
period of time (including myself) and our eyes seem ok for now.

~~~
canttestthis
Because you didn't look at it during an eclipse, when its more dangerous than
looking at it on a regular day.

~~~
kobeya
Looking at the Sun for exactly the same period of time is less dangerous
during an eclipse because a sizable percentage of the radiation, but not all,
is blocked by the Moon.

Where the danger comes in is that normally the Sun is so bright that if you
mistakenly look into it your natural reflexes cause you to flinch away,
prevent anything more than a momentary glimpse lasting fractions of a second.

During an eclipse the Sun is dim enough that you could stare at it without
"visual pain" (for lack of a better term -- whatever you call something that
is too bright) to such a degree as to cause instinctual look-away reflexes.

As a result if you were dumb enough, ignorant enough, or presidential enough,
you could stare straight at the eclipse for seconds or 10's of seconds during
totality. During that time it will not seem "too bright", but nevertheless
your eyes will be focusing intensely damaging UV radiation onto your cornea,
causing those cells to malfunction and die, which is what causes blindness.

That said, this is highly educated, rational crowd. I would not feel
comfortable giving this explanation to a gathering of the general public
because it can easily be misconstrued to mean "this guy says looking at the
Sun during the eclipse is not as dangerous as everyone says it is" which has
the exact opposite implication with respect to safety. I expect this is why
the "looking at the Sun during an eclipse is more dangerous" meme got started
-- it results in better safety.

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jl6
Why is the light reduced by a huge amount during an eclipse but the UV is
still at dangerous levels?

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deadmetheny
Because the moon is in front of the sun. The brightness is reduced during
partial coverage to the point that you won't reflexively look away anymore,
but the UV is still there and still causes eye damage.

~~~
deadmetheny
So why am I being downvoted for answering a question, exactly?

~~~
jstanley
I didn't downvote you, but the reason some did is probably because we want to
know _why_ the UV is still there.

Merely restating that the UV is still there contributes nothing.

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bustadjustme
I don't follow their reasoning. Given their premises:

1\. The solar eclipse of Oct 30, 1207 BC is recorded in the book of Joshua,
describing events concerning the people of Israel in Canaan (specifically, a
battle with some Canaanites).

2\. A battle between Israel and Egypt (under Pharaoh Merneptah, son of
Ramesses II) is recorded on the Merneptah Stele (which says it was recorded in
Merneptah's 5th year).

The researchers conclude:

> So the Israelites must have been in Canaan by Merneptah's fifth year.

> ...

> The confrontation with Israel probably occurred in his year 2 to 4 (Kitchen
> 2006), so 1207 BC is probably year 2, 3 or 4 of Merneptah.

Huh? They must have been in Canaan by 1207, sure, but why does that imply the
Israel/Egypt battle happened in 1207? It seems like 1207 is just an earliest-
possible date for the battle...

From what I can tell, the Merneptah Stele has no other information indicating
it should be linked to the eclipse or the account from Joshua.

Have I just missed something?

~~~
acqq
Moreover, the words from Joshua 10:12-13 in Young's Literal Translation (YLT)
are:

"Then speaketh Joshua to Jehovah in the day of Jehovah's giving up the
Amorites before the sons of Israel, and he saith, before the eyes of Israel,
`Sun -- in Gibeon stand still; and moon -- in the valley of Ajalon;'

and the sun standeth still, and the moon hath stood -- till the nation taketh
vengeance [on] its enemies; is it not written on the Book of the Upright, `and
the sun standeth in the midst of the heavens, and hath not hasted to go in --
as a perfect day?'"

The literal translation is important to see what is actually written in the
Hebrew original. It's definitely not the same as the new (too convenient)
translation that the paper used:

“And the Sun stood still, and the Moon stopped [Hebrew 'amad], until the
nation took vengeance on their enemies,” (Joshua 10:12–13, New Revised
Standard Version [NRSV]).

Note that the literal translation gives the positions of the Sun and Moon and
they are not on the same place when the event happens. Also note that no
eclipse can last "till the nation taketh vengeance [on] its enemies."

Still, it seems to be a one day event, the Ortodox Jewish Bible translates
10:13 as:

"And the shemesh stood still, the yarei’ach stopped, until the Goy had avenged
themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the Sefer HaYasher? So
the shemesh stood still in the middle of Shomayim, and hastened not to go down
about a yom tamim (whole day)."

Yom is "day." תָּמִים is indeed elsewhere translated as "perfect" but the
meaning of "whole" (complete) in this case really has sense:
[http://biblehub.com/hebrew/8549.htm](http://biblehub.com/hebrew/8549.htm)

Still doesn't match a description of an eclipse.

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jcranmer
... That's the claim of an eclipse in Joshua? It's baloney.

I've seen a total eclipse in person. The most dramatic part of it, which
doesn't seem to come out in most modern accounts, is the speed and intensity
of what happens when totality happens: 98% coverage is much tamer than than
100%. The temperature drops by several degrees--it feels like at least 10°F--
and the sky goes from "it feels cloudy" to "it's dusk except I see light in
all directions."

For someone in a pre-Axial Age religion (such as then-contemporary Judaism),
which makes a heavy theme out of the idea that humans need to perform rituals
to literally keep the universe going, the first thoughts are going to be "how
did we screw up?" and even after things return to normal, it's likely to still
leave people with the impression that they narrowly avoided the end of the
universe.

It's difficult to see even a liberal priest making rhetorical flourishes to
older traditions converting an eclipse to that kind of depiction. The text
pretty much has a running theme of "gee, it would be nice if the day were
longer so I could finish slaughtering my enemies;" eclipses (even if not
total) are notable for their very distinct darkening of the sky. The text also
emphasizes that the sun and moon stand still, yet an eclipse is one of the few
times where you can clearly observe the sun and the moon moving against each
other, where you can see clear motion in real time. It's also worth pointing
out that the text also says "nothing like this has ever happened before or
since." This part of the Hebrew bible is suspected of being written somewhere
in the 600s BC, which is more than enough time for other accounts of eclipses
to filter through.

~~~
kobeya
Ring of fire eclipses, which is what this one was, are very different. The sky
doesn't get dark. The temperature doesn't drop. Birds don't go crazy.

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wbhart
The Merneptah Stele says Israel was wiped out. So it's a pretty tenuous
explanation to say that this is the battle recorded in the book of Joshua.
Also the book of Joshua says the battle was against the Amorites, that the sun
delayed going down for a full day, and that Israel was victorious.

I think it is fair to say the majority scholarly opinion (biblical minimalist
or maximalist) is going to consider this theory the work of cranks.

The maximalists don't get their way without a fairly extensive revision of
Egyptian chronology, a la David Rohl [1]. The minimalists consider the record
of the conquest of Canaan by Joshua to be completely ahistorical.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Chronology_(Rohl)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Chronology_\(Rohl\))

~~~
kobeya
The Egyptians wrote their military chronicles before they left, foretelling
their victories. It's very well possible they said they were going to win and
didn't.

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pi-err
A bit OT but how did ancient civilizations know that they should NOT watch an
eclipse with a naked eye? The knowledge would have been lost or unavailable at
each occurence. Remote areas would probably never get the word. So how didn't
they get massive eye damages back then?

~~~
njarboe
Like most dangers communicated to people in the modern world, the danger of
looking at the sun is way overblown. You can look at the sun for over a minute
straight without any damage. How much damage, how fast, what kind of damage,
and how this varies with peoples genetics is not well known, of course. Doing
such experiments would harm peoples eyes. How long can you look at a little
bit of the sun right around the total eclipse? Very not known. But "safety
first" and you get things like and emergency warning sent out to all cell
phones before the eclipse saying not to look at the sun. Looking at the bright
sun is not a pleasant sensation. I imagine people in ancient times were more
in-tune with their physical senses and were less likely to do things that hurt
them just for curiosity sake.

~~~
theoh
"What kind of damage" is pretty well-known.

See e.g. "Light-Induced Damage to the Retina"
[http://photobiology.info/Rozanowska.html](http://photobiology.info/Rozanowska.html)

~~~
njarboe
You are right. Many experiments on animal eyes are highly likely to translate
well to human eyes.

With a little more thought maybe all these warnings exaggerating the dangers
of the sun to your eyes are a good idea. It seems that humans know or learn
"Don't stare into the sun" is a good idea but during an eclipse some people
forget that.

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waynecochran
I’ve seen two total eclipses and one annular eclipse. You wouldn’t even notice
an annular eclipse if you weren’t looking for it. I’m not sure how this would
have helped Joshua or have been worthy of note.

~~~
pavel_lishin
> _You wouldn’t even notice an annular eclipse if you weren’t looking for it._

What? The partial eclipse I saw in 2017 was easily noticeable by anyone who
looked even remotely near the sun.

~~~
skywhopper
To be fair, partial and annular eclipses are noticeable if you are looking for
them, but they are absolutely nothing like a total eclipse, which really would
feel like something apocalyptic if you were to experience it by surprise
without understanding of what you were seeing or knowledge that it was
temporary.

~~~
rtkwe
Yeah, there's definitely a huge difference between those two and a total
eclipse but the assertion keeps coming up that ancient peoples wouldn't notice
unless it was a total eclipse which is ridiculous.

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intellectronica
It is quite uncontroversial nowadays in studies of the biblical texts to
accept that the book of Joshua (as well many of the other foundational texts)
was written in the 7th century BCE. To assume that the writer had any idea
what astronomical events happened centuries earlier is implausible.

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willyjoe
I used to hate that part of the bible, seemed so obviously wrong. But now I
mostly believe it wasn't an eclipse and happened as stated (also Joshua's long
day about 50 years later).

TedX talk on the subject:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eESlenGhKN0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eESlenGhKN0)

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spoiledtechie
It's always interesting to see Scientists use the Bible, when much of the
western world has described it as fiction. I otherwise, believe it to be non-
fiction.

~~~
jmts
You're conflating the theology of the Bible with the history of the Bible. A
(non-believing) scientist/historian might very well decline that Jesus has any
supernatural connection, but agree that it is plausible that he was an actual
person, born of non-supernatural causes, and had his story confused through
time.

I have read theories that God and the Angels just happened to be an
race/community of people that impressed those who met them by their size,
prowess, or their artifacts, and told their story. This sounds entirely
plausible to me as an explanation for the existence of some earthly being who
either became or actually was named God.

Similarly, I have read of the supposed existence of ancient birthing/funeral
rituals whereby the spirit of one individual is tranferred into the body of
another. I can completely rationalise this as an explanation for how
Methuselah and his peers were able to 'live' as long as they did.

Though I no longer remember the book I read these things from, and I do not
claim that they are scientifically or historically accurate, I think it is a
mistake for anyone to suggest that the Bible does not have some historical
importance distinct from religion when the correct context is applied.

I am not sure whether this is the same non-fiction you refer to.

~~~
mamon
>> how Methuselah and his peers were able to 'live' as long as they did

Another possible explanation is that ancient Jews used "Moon years" aka months
as unit of measurement :) Then Methuselah's 969 "years" would translate to 80
years, 9 months.

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peter303
“One chance in ten an individual directly experiences a solar eclipse.” Any
spot on Earth sees one in four centuries; life expectancy 40 years. However
its pretty certain that people would have heard from neigbors who saw one.

Othe eclipses are fairly common. Lunar eclipses are seen everywhere on Earth
every couple years; Moon eclipsing a planet every few years. Combining these
eclipses with rumors of solar eclipses, ancient skywatchers would predict the
Moon would eclipse the Sun sometime.

~~~
ttyprintk
And Ireland claims an even older eclipse
[http://www.astronomy.ca/3340eclipse/](http://www.astronomy.ca/3340eclipse/).
Nov 30, 3340 BC.

