Most people consider the Italian polymath Galileo Galilei to be the father of telescopic astronomy, although a lesser-known English physicist named Thomas Harriot may actually have been the first to observe the Moon through a lens. Despite not publishing a single word of his scientific output, Harriot was a prolific scholar who discovered numerous laws of nature prior to the likes of Newton, Descartes, and Leibniz, and created the first detailed lunar maps several months before Galileo did the same. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.

Born in 1560, Harriot attended Oxford University before being employed by the English statesman and explorer Sir Walter Raleigh to teach astronomy and navigation to sea captains. He even acc

See Full Page