This year´s S.M.A.R.T. Lecture was a truly exceptional experience for the audience: Mathieu Ossendrijver, professor for the history of ancient science at the Humboldt University in Berlin, presented his findings on astronomic calculations of ancient Babylonians in our fully booked lecture hall.

From five cuneiform tablets, dating from 350 to 50 BCE, Ossendrijver decrypted a sophisticated calculation method to determine and predict Jupiter’s position. According to his findings, more than two thousand years ago the Babylonian astronomers were able to compute a body´s displacement as an area in time-velocity space – a mathematical operation that was hitherto thought to be invented only in the middle ages.

Ossendrijver’s discovery was a true sensation – when he published his findings in Science, it not only astonished his colleagues, but found a broad resonance all over the world. His work changed the view on ancient Babylonian astronomy, and above that, it showed that their mathematical skills might even have had an unprecedented impact on Greek mathematicians and their successors.

The lecture was followed by a lively and fruitful discussion that continued at the subsequent reception – it rounded up this wonderful and enlightening evening. Our warmest thanks to Mathieu Ossendrijver´s for a magnificent and memorable S.M.A.R.T. Lecture!