Sky & Telescope February 1979 [antikvár]

A Tale of Two EclipsesLaurence A. Marschall, Gettysburg CollegeFew people would deny that eclipses of the sun and moon rank among the most impressive phenomena of nature. Yet most of us in this modern age view them with a sense of detachment unprecedented in human history. We have been taught to regard eclipses as astronomical events rather than omens. There is awe accompanying an eclipse, of course, but it is tempered by an understanding that we are watching part of a celestial clockwork which operates with mindless precision. The only fear inspired by an eclipse nowadays is directed at the danger of exposing one's eyes to the unshielded rays of theBecause we are as enlightened as we are, we may easily forget that, until the development of modern science, eclipses figured prominently in the affairs of men. To those who did not understand them, eclipses were surprising, ominous, and awesome. At the same time, to those few who did understand them, however crudely, the prediction of eclipses was an immense source of power and prestige. We read in ancient histories of battles lost and won, dynasties forged or broken, and lives saved or lost because of foreknowledge of an eclipse, or the lack of it.One does not have to look back to antiquity, however, to find examples of the powerful impact of eclipses on men's minds. Two cases from relatively recent history illustrate plainly how men with some cognizance of the roots of natural phenomena were able to exercise their will over groups of people who were ignorant of the origins of eclipses. The first is a familiar account of how a clever European used an almanac and a fortuitous lunar eclipse to win the respect and support of a tribe of reluctant Indians. The second, which is far less widely known, is a tale of how an Indian religious leader, three centuries later, turned the eclipse tables on the white men by using a solar eclipse to build a strong religious movement among the Shawnee tribes of 19th-century Indiana and Ohio.The European of our first account was, of course. Christopher Columbus. During the 15 years following his first landing in the New World, Columbus organized and led three additional expeditions to the West, visiting many of the islands of the Caribbean and the shores of Central America. To Ferdinand and Isabella, his financial backers, the purpose of the voyages was not simple exploration gold and religion motivated them far more than curiosity. As they saw it. their admiral was to bring the word of God to theheathen and to secure In return the riches of the Indies. Columbus did not quibble with these charges, but to him the journeys were equally important to save his good name, to vindicate his claim that one could reach China by sailing westward. Underestimating the size of the globe, he believed to his death that the glorious kingdom of China lay only a short sail from the islands he had already discovered.Thus it was a futile search for a strait to the Indian Ocean that led Columbus to the western shores of the Caribbean in the years 1502 and 1503. It was his fourth voyage to the New World, a voyage marked by a sense of frustration and desperation. The admiral was growing old; support for his enterprises was failing both among his men and among his backers in Spain; only a striking new discovery could restore the tarnished glory. Unfortunately, as far as Columbus was concerned, the fourth voyage was no more successful than the earlier ones had been. Although he explored the coasts of present-day Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama, he discovered neither gold nor a passage to China. Along the way two ships of his fleet were lost to shipworms and abandoned on the shore, their hulls turned to sieves by the voracious borers.Columbus' remaining two ships headed north from Panama in May, 1503. intending to stop at the colony of Hispaniola for refitting before returning home to Spain. They never made it. Crippled by a six-day storm and pierced by the shipworms, the two Spanish caravels were run ashore on the north coast of Jamaica. There they stayed, Columbus and over 100 of his men on board. While the shipworms feasted and his men grumbled, Columbus formulated a plan to secure their rescue.The plan was simple. A dozen crewmen and a number of Indian guides set out in two canoes to reach the colony on Hispaniola, about 200 miles to the east. The remaining Spaniards, including Columbus himself, camped out in the beached caravels awaiting the return of the rescue party. At the same time contacts were made with the Indians from nearby villages, who agreed to provide the stranded Europeans with daily food supplies, in return for which the Spaniards offered small items such as beads, mirrors, and scissors.Although the two canoes eventually reached the Spanish outpost, help was not immediately forthcoming. Columbus and his men waited through the summer and fall of 1503 with no word from civilization. The men grew restive and mutinous and. in January, 1504, almost half the