Lecture demonstration of the 1769 transit by Benjamin Martin
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Benjamin Martin devised a large demonstration of the appearance of the 1769 transit. The device was 7 by 5? feet in size and mounted on a wall in his shop where he gave lectures. It showed the appearance of the transit at London, with a mechanical arrangement to reproduce the movement of Venus over the sun as it sank towards sunset. Jean Bernoulli attended one of Martin's lectures in January 1769 and remarked on his use of the 'artificial' transit. This engraving was published as a frontispiece to Martin's "Institutions of Astronomical Calculations" (London, 1773).
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Object contributed by Museum of the History of Science, University of Oxford
