Both the popular and technical literature contain many references to lunar eclipses of the past. Some of these references are from ancient texts. In other cases, they are attempts to tie an eclipse with a historical event. The purpose of this web page is to present eclipse calculations for many such eclipses mentioned in the literature.
The inclusion of an historical event in the tables below does not imply validation of the historical event nor its connection with an eclipse. Some events may be either apocryphal or fictional, or an eclipse may be incorrectly associated with a particular event. The eclipse maps and calculations are simply presented so that they may be compared with references in the literature. It is left to the reader to evaluate whether the eclipse association is valid or not.
The following two tables list lunar eclipses identified with some historical event of note. When selected, each Calendar Date links to a figure showing the Moon's path though Earth's shadows along with the Greenwich times of each phase of the eclipse. Below the path figure is a world map showing the region of visibility for each phase of the eclipse. These figures are described in greater detail in the Key to Lunar Eclipse Maps. Each figure is stored as a GIF of 65 kilobytes.
Sources and/or literary references to many of these eclipses may be found at:
Ancient and Early Medieval Eclipses in European Sources
The references at the bottom of this page are also recommended for information on lunar eclipses of historical interest. Those who are unfamiliar with the basic astronomy of lunar eclipses may want to visit Lunar Eclipses for Beginners. A complementary web page Solar Eclipses of Historical Interest is also available.
This web site is a work in progress. If you know of an historic eclipse of interest, please email the date and a little information or reference about the event to fred.espenak@nasa.gov. I will generate a map for the eclipse and add it to this page.
Lunar Eclipses: 2000 BCE to 1 BCE[3] | ||||||
Calender Date | Eclipse Type |
Umbral Magnitude[1] |
Eclipse Duration[2] |
Description/Event | ||
(Link to Eclipse and Map) | ||||||
-0746 Feb 06 ( 747 Feb 06 BCE) |
Partial | 0.920 | 03h25m |
Babylonian Eclipse See Note | ||
-0424 Oct 09 ( 425 Oct 09 BCE) |
Total | 1.404 | 03h40m [01h28m] |
The choice of Cleon "... the moon deserted her course and the sun at once veiled his beam threatening, no longer to give you light, if Cleon became general." from Aristophanes, The Clouds Wikipedia |
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-0412 Aug 28 ( 413 Aug 28 BCE) |
Total | 1.092 | 03h23m [00h46m] |
Siege of Syracuse See Note Article Wikipedia | ||
-0405 Apr 15 ( 406 Apr 15 BCE) |
Total | 1.279 | 03h25m [01h14m] |
Fire in the temple of Athena See Note | ||
-0330 Sep 20 ( 331 Sep 20 BCE) |
Total | 1.211 | 03h18m [01h04m] |
Eclipse before Arbela battle of Alexander the Great "But about the first watch the Moon in eclipse, hid at first the brilliance of her heavenly body, then all her light was sullied and suffused with the hue of blood." from History of Alexander Wikipedia |
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-0167 Jun 21 ( 168 Jun 21 BCE) |
Total | 1.251 | 03h42m [01h16m] |
Gallus explains lunar eclipse before the battle "When there was an eclipse of the moon in the time of Perseus of Macedonia, the report gained popular credence that it portented the eclipse of the king." from Polibius, The Histories Wikipedia |
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-0128 Nov 05 ( 129 Nov 05 BCE) |
Partial | 0.620 | 02h51m | Death of Carneades See Note Wikipedia | ||
-0004 Mar 23 ( 5 Mar 23 BCE) |
Total | 1.818 | 03h43m [01h43m] |
Death of Herod "As for the other Matthias who had stirred up the sedition, he (Herod) had him burned alive along with some of his companions. And on that same night there was an eclipse of the Moon. But Herod's illness became more and more severe. . . ." from Flavius Josephus Wikipedia |
Lunar Eclipses: 1 CE to 2000 CE[3] | Date | Eclipse Type |
Umbral Magnitude[1] |
Eclipse Duration[2] |
Description/Event | |
(Link to Eclipse and Map) | ||||||
0014 Sep 27 | Total | 1.666 | 03h36m [01h38m] |
Death of Augustus See Note | ||
0033 Apr 03 | Partial | 0.586 | 02h52m | Crucifixion of Christ? See References | ||
0071 Mar 04 | Partial | 0.408 | 02h19m | Pliny - Two Eclipses in 15 Days "For the eclipse of both sun and moon within 15 days of each other has occured even in our time, in the year of the third consulship of the elder Emperor Vespasian and the second consulship of the younger." from Pliny, "Natural History" |
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0734 Jan 24 | Total | 1.584 | 03h47m [01h35m] |
Eclipses of Tatwine and Beda "the Moon was as if it had been sprinkled with blood, and Archbishop Tatwine and Beda died and Ecgberht was hallowed bishop." from The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle |
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0828 Jul 01 / Dec 25 | Total | 1.802/1.026 | 03h31m [01h29m]/ 03h29m [00h26m] |
European Eclipses "In this year the Moon was eclipsed on mid-winter's Mass-night, and the same year King Ecgbryght subdued the kingdom of the Mercians and all that was South of the Humber." from The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle |
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1349 Jul 01 | Total | 1.823 | 03h33m [01h39m] |
A Witch's Eclipse See Note | ||
1433 Jul 02 | Partial | 0.517 | 02h43m | Two Eclipses in 15 Days See Note | ||
1453 May 22 | Partial | 0.749 | 02h59m | Fall of Constantinople Wikipedia | ||
1457 Sep 03 | Total | 1.253 | 03h19m [01h09m] |
Time Error Eclipse See Note | ||
1504 Mar 01 | Total | 1.100 | 03h26m [00h49m] |
Columbus' Eclipse See Note Space.com Article Wikipedia | ||
1573 Dec 08 | Total | 1.560 | 03h33m [01h33m] |
Brahe's Eclipse See Note | ||
1776 Jul 31 | Total | 1.597 | 03h33m [01h36m] |
James Cook's Lunar Eclipse - 1 Wikipedia | ||
1777 Jan 23 | Partial | 0.600 | 02h48m | James Cook's Lunar Eclipse - 2 | ||
1777 Jul 20 | Partial | 0.115 | 01h18m | James Cook's Lunar Eclipse - 3 | ||
1778 Dec 04 | Partial | 0.510 | 02h25m | James Cook's Lunar Eclipse - 4 | ||
1805 Jan 15 | Total | 1.747 | 03h34m [01h39m] |
The Lewis and Clark Eclipse Wikipedia | ||
1863 Nov 25 | Partial | 0.957 | 03h21m | Gordon's Eclipse | ||
1917 Jul 04 | Total | 1.624 | 03h33m [01h37m] |
Lawrence of Arabia's Eclipse "By my diary there was an eclipse. Duly it came, and the Arabs forced the post without loss, while the superstitious soldiers were firing rifles and clanging copper pots to rescue the threatened satellite." from Thomas Edward Lawrence Wikipedia |
[1] Umbral magnitude is the fraction of the Moon's diameter obscured by Earth's Umbra. For partial eclipses, the umbral magnitude is always greater than 0 and less than 1. For total eclipses, the umbral magnitude is always greater than or equal to 1.
[2] Eclipse Duration is the duration of the partial eclipse. Total eclipses have a partial phase both before and after the total phase. Thus, two eclipse durations are listed for total eclipses. The first duration is for the entire eclipse (partial and total phases combined) and the second duration (in '[ ]') is for the total phase only.
[3] BCE and CE are abbreviations for "Before Common Era" and "Common Era," respectively. They are the secular equivalents to the BC and AD dating conventions. (See:Year Dating Conventions)
-0746 Feb 02 - Babylonian Eclipse
-0412 Aug 28 - Siege of Syracuse
-0405 Apr 15 - Fire in the temple of Athena
-0128 Nov 05 - Death of Carneades
0014 Sep 27 - Death of Augustus
1349 Jul 01 - A Witch's Eclipse
1433 Jul 02 - Two Eclipses in 15 Days
1457 Sep 03 - Time Error Eclipse
1504 Mar 01 - Columbus' Eclipse
1573 Dec 08 - Brahe's Eclipse
For more information on eclipses of historic interest, see the following:
Brewer, B., Eclipse, Earth View, Seattle, 1991
Humphreys, Colin J. and Waddington, W. G., "Dating the Crucifixion", Nature, Vol. 306, No. 5945, p.743-746, 22 December 1983
Littmann, M., Willcox, K., and Espenak, F. Totality - Eclipses of the Sun, Oxford University Press, New York, 1999
Schaefer, Bradley E., "Solar Eclipses That Changed the World", Sky and Telescope, May, 1994, p.36-39
Schaefer, Bradley E., "Lunar Eclipses That Changed the World", Sky and Telescope, December, 1992, p.639-642
Schaefer, Bradley E., "Dating the Crucifixion", Sky and Telescope, April, 1989, p.374
Schaefer, Bradley E., "Lunar Visibility and the Crucifixion", Q.Jl. R. astr. Soc., 1990, 31, p.53-67
Steel, Duncan, "Eclipse", 1999
The coordinates of the Sun used in these predictions are based on the VSOP87 theory [Bretagnon and Francou, 1988]. The Moon's coordinates are based on the ELP-2000/82 theory [Chapront-Touze and Chapront, 1983]. For more information, see: Solar and Lunar Ephemerides. The revised value used for the Moon's secular acceleration is n-dot = -25.858 arc-sec/cy*cy, as deduced from the Apollo lunar laser ranging experiment (Chapront, Chapront-Touze, and Francou, 2002).
The largest uncertainty in the eclipse predictions is caused by fluctuations in Earth's rotation due primarily to tidal friction of the Moon. The resultant drift in apparent clock time is expressed as ΔT and is determined as follows:
A series of polynomial expressions have been derived to simplify the evaluation of ΔT for any time from -1999 to +3000. The uncertainty in ΔT over this period can be estimated from scatter in the measurements.
Special thanks to National Space Club summer intern Wesley Ripley for his assistance in updating and expanding this web page (July 2008).
All eclipse calculations are by Fred Espenak, and he assumes full responsibility for their accuracy.
Permission is freely granted to reproduce this data when accompanied by an acknowledgment:
"Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA's GSFC"
2008 July 08