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				Astrologers of Nineveh "Invented Telescope"

By Bruce Johnston in Rome
June 1, 1999

THE Assyrians, and not Galileo, invented the telescope, and used it to observe the stars and develop astrology, a book by an Italian academic claims.

Giovanni Pettinato, Professor of Assyriology at La Sapienza University, in Rome, said his theory was based on artefacts kept in the British Museum. They include a lens made of rock crystal found by the British archaeologist A H Layard in 1850 in Nineveh, capital of the Assyrian empire, now in Iraq.

Prof Pettinato said the lens acquired a whole new meaning if considered in the context of Assyrian cuneiform tablets which originated in the royal archives in Nineveh and are now in the British Museum. Their translation was published in 1992.

Dating from about 750BC, they listed goods that had passed through various offices of the Assyrian court, including "lenses" and "tubes of gold". Other documents said the lenses were used by the court astronomers and had the purpose of "enlarging the eye".

In his new book, La Scrittura Celeste (The Heavenly Scripture), Prof Pettinato dedicates a chapter to his theory that the Assyrians used the telescope. The observations by ancient astronomers could not have been made with the naked eye, he says.

"The first true compendium of astronomy is Babylonian, and certainly dates back beyond 1000BC," Prof Pettinato was quoted as telling Milan's Corriere della Sera. "In this work 72 stars and constellations are listed, including the planets."

He adds that more than 4,000 cuneiform texts on astronomy have been found. "Among these documents, which list the names of no fewer than 4,000 stars, there are to be found texts showing how to calculate the movement of the sun, the moon, and the five planets then known [Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn]."