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A Total Solar Eclipse is expected in April and can be seen across most of North America. As a result, authorities in the United States expect a significant increase in tourists to observe the phenomenon, which last occurred in 2017. The “disappearance” of the Sun, however, has already happened in the past and is linked to mythologies and traditions of ancient peoples.
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Ancient accounts of the Total Solar Eclipse
For millennia, eclipses have inspired awe, awe, and fear. And it is not difficult to imagine that the phenomenon awakened a series of different feelings in the planet’s inhabitants in the past. But anyone who believes that people didn’t know what was happening is mistaken.
Anyone who pays attention to the sky would be well aware that the Moon is blocking the Sun. But the meaning of this event would have been very different to ancient people. Cultures different from ours, present and past, have had a very different view of the natural world.
Anthony Aveni, professor of anthropology and astronomy at Colgate University in New York
Many ancient cultures believed that what happened in the heavens reflected past, present, and future events on Earth. This is the case of the Mayans, who saw distance in space and distance in time as one. In other words, looking far into the cosmos acted as a kind of portal to the past.
When the ancient Mayans saw eclipses, they interpreted it as insight into the cannibalistic practices of their ancestors, which had long been eliminated by Mayan laws. For them, the phenomenon was a reminder that the social order is always in danger.
In Chinese mythology, solar eclipses occurred when a dragon tried to devour the Sun. In response, people gathered in the streets, beating drums to scare the animal. A record of the phenomenon that occurred in 2134 BC reported that “the Sun and Moon did not meet harmoniously”.
For the ancient Greeks, on the other hand, the phenomena were a sign of the gods’ discontent with humans: the Sun was abandoning the Earth. The word eclipse actually comes from the Greek word “ekleipsis”, which means “abandonment”.
There is nothing but hope, nothing that can be sworn impossible, nothing wonderful, since Zeus, father of the Olympians, made night from noon, hiding the light of the bright Sun, and painful fear came upon men .
Poet Archilochus about a solar eclipse in 647 BC
The next eclipse
- On April 8th this year, the Moon will cover the Sun in a Total Solar Eclipse that can be seen from various regions of North America, allowing millions of people to observe the phenomenon, which results in an almost perfect coverage of the star. Unfortunately, the event will not be seen from Brazil.
- The phenomenon is the same as that recorded in 2017, but there are some differences.
- In the last event of this type, the Moon was a little further away from Earth, so the range where the phenomenon could be observed in its entirety varied from 100 to 115 kilometers wide.
- In what happens in April, this range will vary from 170 to 200 kilometers.
- This year’s Total Solar Eclipse will be visible in cities and more densely populated areas, allowing 31.6 million people to watch the phenomenon, compared to 12 million in 2017.
- In the 2017 eclipse, the longest period of totality occurred near Carbondale, Illinois and lasted 2 minutes and 42 seconds.
- In 2024, it will be longest near Torreón, Mexico, lasting about 4 minutes and 26 seconds.
- Durations longer than 4 minutes, however, will also occur up to close to the Canadian border, when the eclipse will last 3 minutes and 21 seconds;
- Another difference is that the year 2024 is closer to solar maximum, where the star’s activity is greatest.
- Therefore, when the Moon covers the Sun, it is very likely that fire snakes will appear in the stellar corona, unlike the simpler appearance in 2017.
