+++ images of the solar eclipse

["727.5"]

Total Solar Eclipse Science | images of the solar eclipse

images of the solar eclipse

A absolute solar concealment apparent on Aug. 21, 2017, from Wyoming.

["6790"]

The Beauty and Science of a Total Solar Eclipse | Time.com | images of the solar eclipse

The Old Testament Book of Joshua may accommodate the oldest accustomed advertence to a solar concealment recorded by humanity. And it occurred 810 years ago today (Oct. 30).

If so, this anapestic advertence firms up the dates of the administration of the Egyptian pharaoh Ramesses the Great (also alleged Ramesses II), according to a new cardboard appear in the account Astronomy & Geophysics.

["1241.6"]

Solar Eclipse 101 | National Geographic - YouTube | images of the solar eclipse

The argument in catechism is in the 12th and 13th verses of the 10th affiliate of the Book of Joshua. According to the King James adaptation of the Bible, these verses read, "Then spake Joshua to the Lord in the day aback the Lord delivered up the Amorites afore the accouchement of Israel, and he said in the afterimage of Israel, Sun, angle thou still aloft Gibeon, and thou, Moon, in the basin of Ajalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the bodies had avenged themselves aloft their enemies. … So, the sun stood still in the bosom of heaven, and hasted not to go bottomward about a accomplished day." [See Photos of the Mummy of Another Egyptian Pharaoh - Ramesses III]

The access is allotment of the adventure of Joshua arch the Israelites into Canaan (today's Israel and Palestine) and assault aback their enemies (the Amorites) afterwards the Amorite armies laid annoy to the Israelite camp. Astronomically speaking, the argument may accredit to a solar concealment (when the moon blocks the sun's ablaze from extensive portions of the Earth), said Sir Colin Humphreys, a abstracts science assistant at the University of Cambridge in England.

["388"]

Solar eclipse 2017: Here's everything you need to know | images of the solar eclipse

The King James adaptation of the Bible refers to the sun and moon continuing still, Humphreys said, but the aboriginal Hebrew uses a basis chat that, in Babylonian, a accompanying tongue, can additionally call eclipses. What Joshua may accept prayed, in added words, was not that the moon and sun would benumb in the sky, but that they would stop their accustomed shining.

Previous advisers accept attempted to validate this concealment antecedent by bond the Book of Joshua to an absolute indicator of aback the Israelites were in Canaan: a brace from the administration of the Egyptian pharaoh Merneptah, son of Ramesses the Great. The Merneptah stele, carved in the fifth year of Merneptah's reign, mentions that the pharaoh ordered a (successful) attack adjoin the bodies of Israel in Canaan. Dating the brace puts the Israelites in Canaan amid 1500 B.C. and 1050 B.C.

["1164"]

Why Eclipses Happen | Exploratorium | images of the solar eclipse

But until now, scientists haven't had abundant luck cross-referencing the two dates. Ample calculations angry up no absolute solar eclipses that matched. Humphreys and his colleagues broadcast the chase to accommodate not alone absolute eclipses, but additionally annular eclipses. In these angelic events, the moon block amid the Earth and the sun but not at a ambit at which it appears to awning the sun's face entirely. The aftereffect is an absorbing affectation that looks like a arena of blaze in the sky, but after the abrupt afterglow black of a absolute solar eclipse.

Humphreys and his colleagues use ample calculations to actuate that the alone annular concealment arresting from Canaan amid 1500 B.C. and 1050 B.C. was on the afternoon of Oct. 30, 1207 B.C. The capacity in the brace added suggest, then, that Merneptah's administration began in 1210 B.C. or 1209 B.C., the advisers appear today. That pegs Ramesses the Great's administration from 1276 B.C. to about 1210 B.C. Previous estimates put his afterlife at about 1213 B.C. Ramesses is acclaimed for his aggressive campaigns in Canaan and Nubia and for abrogation abaft arresting statues of himself in temples and monuments.

["955.45"]

Media Invited to Briefings on August Total Solar Eclipse | NASA | images of the solar eclipse

"The absolute dates of the pharaohs accept been accountable to some ambiguity amid Egyptologists," Humphreys said in a statement, "but this new calculation, if accepted, could advance to an acclimation in the dates of several of their reigns and accredit us to date them precisely."

Original commodity on Live Science.

["970"]