Eclipse of Peace: The Ancient Solar Phenomenon That Stopped a War

The 585 B.C. Eclipse of Peace turned fearfulness into ceasefire, arsenic a star eclipse halted warfare and reshaped past views of the heavens. Image: Defeat of Croesus astatine the Battle of Thymbra, 546 BC. Credit: Walter Hutchinson 1877 / Public Domain

On May 28, 585 B.C., a uncommon celestial event turned a battlefield into a spot of peace. As the armies of King Alyattes II of Lydia and King Cyaxares of the Medes prepared for yet different clash, the midday prima abruptly vanished. Day became night. This unexpected darkness—now known arsenic the Eclipse of Peace—stunned some sides and brought an abrupt halt to the war.

To past observers, the star eclipse was a fearful motion from the heavens. The warring kings, seeing the lawsuit arsenic a divine warning, agreed to extremity their six-year conflict. Peace was sealed with a royal matrimony betwixt the 2 dynasties: the girl of the Lydian king wed the lad of the Median ruler.

Eclipse of Peace predicted by Thales of Miletus

The eclipse didn’t conscionable halt a war—it marked a turning constituent successful however radical understood the sky. At the bosom of this infinitesimal successful past stood Thales of Miletus, the Greek philosopher and idiosyncratic said to person predicted the sun’s disappearance.

“They were inactive warring with adjacent success, erstwhile it happened, astatine an brushwood which occurred successful the sixth year, that during the conflict the time was abruptly turned to night. Thales of Miletus had foretold this nonaccomplishment of daylight to the Ionians, fixing it wrong the twelvemonth successful which the alteration did so happen. So erstwhile the Lydians and Medes saw the time turned to night, they stopped fighting, and some were the much anxious to marque peace. Those who reconciled them were Syennesis the Cilician and Labynetus the Babylonian; they brought it astir that determination should beryllium a sworn statement and a compact of matrimony betwixt them: they judged that Alyattes should springiness his girl Aryenis to Astyages, lad of Cyaxares; for without beardown constraint agreements volition not support their force. These nations marque sworn compacts arsenic bash the Greeks; and besides, erstwhile they chopped the tegument of their arms, they lick each other’s blood.” (Herodotus, Histories)

A displacement from superstition to reason

Thales’s prediction, though lacking modern precision, echoed done the centuries, which Herodotus recounted successful “The Histories.” Plutarch praised Thales arsenic the lone omniscient antheral of the clip who carried his speculations beyond the realm of the applicable (Life of Solon, section 3). Later, Greeks named him among their seven wisest men.

The eclipse marked much than a bid treaty. It was a turning constituent successful however radical viewed the heavens. Until then, eclipses were seen arsenic divine warnings. Thales introduced a caller lens—reason and observation.

“Everywhere you look, from modern times back, everyone wanted predictions,” said Mathieu Ossendrijver, an Assyriologist astatine the Free University of Berlin. He said Babylonian kings “were frightened to decease by eclipses.”

Centuries earlier Thales, past cultures tried to recognize the skies. Stonehenge whitethorn person been utilized to way celestial cycles. The Chinese and Mayans recorded eclipses. But it was successful Babylonia—a Mesopotamian empire—that astronomers recovered existent predictive power.

Babylonians laid the instauration for eclipse science

Babylonian scholars documented lunar eclipses connected clay tablets starting astir 750 B.C. They noticed patterns—most notably an 18-year rhythm present known arsenic the Saros. Their insights allowed predictions of lunar eclipses with astonishing accuracy.

“They could foretell them precise well,” said John M. Steele, a historiographer of past subject astatine Brown University.

Babylonians focused connected lunar eclipses due to the fact that they were much visible. Earth’s shadiness during specified events covered a wide area. Solar eclipses, by contrast, were harder to witness. Their constrictive paths—only astir 100 miles wide—made them little accessible.

Thales, scholars suggest, whitethorn person utilized Babylonian methods. Though experts debated his accuracy—Otto Neugebauer called it “very doubtful” successful 1957—some person softened that stance.

Was Thales fortunate oregon brilliant?

Modern researchers, including astronomer Mark Littmann and retired NASA physicist Fred Espenak, accidental Thales could person predicted the wide timing, if not the nonstop location. “He was lucky,” said physicist Leo Dubal.

Greek knowledge precocious steadily. Four centuries aft Thales, the Antikythera mechanism, a analyzable gear-driven device, could foretell eclipse dates, though not totality paths. The Babylonians’ 18-year rhythm remained successful usage good into the Renaissance.

A breakthrough came successful 1543 erstwhile Nicolaus Copernicus placed the prima astatine the halfway of the star system. Isaac Newton’s instrumentality of gravity successful 1687 followed, enabling nonstop eclipse calculations.

From Newton to NASA: eclipse prediction reaches caller heights

In 1714, Newton’s person Edmond Halley published a representation predicting a star eclipse crossed England. His nationalist entreaty to observe it marked the archetypal large-scale eclipse study. His results adjacent outperformed Britain’s Astronomer Royal.

Today, astronomers usage Newton’s laws and almighty computers to forecast eclipses much than 10,000 years into the future. Dr. Espenak built NASA’s database listing star eclipses—including 1 successful the twelvemonth 5814, expected implicit present-day Madagascar.

That moment, similar the 1 Thales reportedly predicted, volition crook time into night—now understood not arsenic a divine warning, but a earthy wonder. And with it lives the bequest of a antheral who erstwhile looked to the entity and dared to explicate it.