First page of the first printed edition, issued by Ratdolt, of the Alphonsine Tables.

First page of the first printed edition, issued by Ratdolt, of the Alphonsine Tables.

Detail map of Venezia, Veneto, Italy,Toledo, Castilla-La Mancha, Spain,Córdoba, Andalucía, Spain

A: Venezia, Veneto, Italy, B: Toledo, Castilla-La Mancha, Spain, C: Córdoba, Andalucía, Spain

The Tabulae Alphonsinae Are Among the Earliest Printed Mathematical Tables

7/4/1483
An example of a printed table from the first edition of the Alphonsine Tables.

An example of a printed table from the first printed edition of the Alphonsine Tables.

On July 4, 1483 German printer Erhard Ratdolt, working in Venice, published Tabulae Alphonsinae or the Alphonsine Tables, a compilation of astronomical data tabulating the positions and movements of the planets.

The Alphonsine Tables were among the first mathematical tables printed. The tables were computed at Toledo, Spain, from 1262 to 1272 by about 50 astronomers (human computers) assembled for the purpose by King Alfonso X of Castile and León, known as el Sabio, "the learned."  They were a revision and improvement of the Tables of the Cordoban mathematician/astronomer Abū Ishāq Ibrāhīm al-Zarqālī, retaining the Ptolemaic system for explaining celestial motion. The original Spanish version was lost, and the tables became known through Latin translation.

ISTC no. ia00534000. In November 2013 a digital facsimile was available from the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek at this link.

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