Attalus of Rhodes

Attalus of Rhodes (Greek: Ἄτταλος ὁ Ῥόδιος) was an ancient Greek grammarian, astronomer, and mathematician, who lived in Rhodes in the 2nd century BC, and was a contemporary of Hipparchus.[1] He wrote a commentary on the Phaenomena of Aratus.[1][2][3] Although this work is lost,[2] Hipparchus cites him in his Commentary on the Phaenomena of Eudoxus and Aratus.[3] Attalus sought to defend both Aratus and Eudoxus against criticisms from contemporary astronomers and mathematicians.[1][3]

Book IV of Apollonius of Perga's Conics is addressed to someone named Attalus, and it has been suggested that this may have been Attalus of Rhodes. However, this is not a good match chronologically, and Attalus was a common name at the time, so the connection is only speculative.[4]
References

Kidd, Douglas (1997), Aratus: Phaenomena, Cambridge University Press, p. 18, ISBN 9780521582308.
Gutzwiller, Kathryn (2008), A Guide to Hellenistic Literature, John Wiley & Sons, p. 97, ISBN 9780470766088.
Dickey, Eleanor (2007), Ancient Greek Scholarship: A Guide to Finding, Reading, and Understanding Scholia, Commentaries, Lexica, and Grammatical Treatises : From Their Beginnings to the Byzantine Period, Oxford University Press, pp. 56–57, ISBN 9780198042662.
Fried, Michael N. (2001), Apollonius of Perga's Conica: Text, Context, Subtext, Mnemosyne, Bibliotheca Classica Batava, 222, BRILL, p. 416, ISBN 9789004119772.

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Ancient Greek astronomy
Astronomers

Aglaonice Agrippa Anaximander Andronicus Apollonius Aratus Aristarchus Aristyllus Attalus Autolycus Bion Callippus Cleomedes Cleostratus Conon Eratosthenes Euctemon Eudoxus Geminus Heraclides Hicetas Hipparchus Hippocrates of Chios Hypsicles Menelaus Meton Oenopides Philip of Opus Philolaus Posidonius Ptolemy Pytheas Seleucus Sosigenes of Alexandria Sosigenes the Peripatetic Strabo Thales Theodosius Theon of Alexandria Theon of Smyrna Timocharis

Works

Almagest (Ptolemy) On Sizes and Distances (Hipparchus) On the Sizes and Distances (Aristarchus) On the Heavens (Aristotle)

Instruments

Antikythera mechanism Armillary sphere Astrolabe Dioptra Equatorial ring Gnomon Mural instrument Triquetrum

Concepts

Callippic cycle Celestial spheres Circle of latitude Counter-Earth Deferent and epicycle Equant Geocentrism Heliocentrism Hipparchic cycle Metonic cycle Octaeteris Solstice Spherical Earth Sublunary sphere Zodiac

Influences

Babylonian astronomy Egyptian astronomy

Influenced

Medieval European science Indian astronomy Medieval Islamic astronomy

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