The Power of Stars

The author's passion for astronomy, astrophysics and cosmology is evident throughout. And it is a beautiful book: illustrations and photographs decorate almost every page.The book begins with what people can see in the sky unaided by telescopes. Penprase describes the movements of the moon, sun, planets and stars, and provides some excellent suggestions for home observations. This serves as the foundation for a survey of cosmology from around the world. Penprase weaves astronomy with anthropology to provide an entertaining overview of Indian, Chinese, Mayan, Incan, native American, Persian and European cosmologies.From ancient cosmology, Penprase jumps to modern, scientific cosmology, starting with the history of time-keeping devices and observational instruments like telescopes. He provides brief biographies of the key figures who built modern astronomy and astrophysics, including Edwin Hubble and George Ellery Hale.Finally, Penprase provides a census of the modern universe: stars, star clusters, normal galaxies, irregular galaxies and galaxy clusters. It leads into a discussion of dark matter and dark energy, and a brief history of the universe.Penprase has written a very entertaining book without compromising or diluting technical details. Highly recommended!Jeff Knowlton

Lots of good information

Very goodCross views celestial observation by humans for thousand of years and influence for our cultures.Great bibliography, i just love it!

An informative book about the oral history of stars, moon and sun. How they were and currently used by various civilizations.

very nice book and good seller service

This is the assigned textbook for my Cultural Astronomy class. It is needlessly complicated and doesn't have things like vocab words or review questions. This textbook has been the worst one I've encountered in three years of college. To be a textbook it should have to ya know... have standard textbook components.

Wonderful book

Terrible textbook. Wikipedia urls for photos, poor JPEGs, contradictory information. Thin paper, seemed homemade.

Leider sind die enthaltenen Fotos und Abbildungen von extrem schlechter Qualität (z.B. aus dem Internet kopiert -mit Linkangabe- und sehr verpixelt). Abbildungen von Machu Picchu in schwarz-weiss und offensichtlich von einem Ausstellungs-Foto nochmal abfotografiert. Das ist fas schon eine Beleidung des Lesers.Thematisch und vom Text her in Ordnung. Ein Buch zum lesen, aber nicht zum durchschauen. Ohne Bilder wäre es besser.Einen weiteren Stern bekommt das Buch für den guten Preis (34 EURO) und die gute Bindung (gebundenen Ausgabe). Insgesamt aber keine Empfehlung. Schade.

Awesome..brand new!

Brillaint - great deal - I think that the author has done our world agreat service Thanks you and keep up the good work

A simple and well written guide to the beliefs and ideas, the movements and mythology of sun, moon and stars. This book provides a good foundation for further study.