{
  "author": "ChronologiaOS editorial guides",
  "date": "2026-10-09",
  "department": "Astronomy & Calendars",
  "department_id": "SKY",
  "epistemic_label": "Source guide",
  "epistemic_status": "SOURCE_GUIDE",
  "period": "652\u2013651 BCE",
  "place": "Babylon",
  "public_sources": [
    {
      "publisher": "Earth, Planets and Space / Springer Nature",
      "title": "Earliest datable records of aurora-like phenomena in the astronomical diaries from Babylonia",
      "type": "Peer-reviewed article",
      "url": "https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s40623-016-0571-5"
    }
  ],
  "publication_state": "PUBLIC",
  "read_time": "3 min read",
  "sections": [
    {
      "body": "A 2016 article in Earth, Planets and Space uses the Astronomical Diaries, a corpus of Babylonian observational tablets held by the British Museum, to identify the earliest datable records of aurora-like phenomena. It discusses the diary tablet BM 32312 in a context of 652 to 651 BCE.",
      "heading": "Start with the study",
      "source": 0
    },
    {
      "body": "The research record describes the diary entries as regular observation: dated notes of the sky and of events on the ground. That regularity is what makes the corpus valuable for chronology. A dated sky entry can be checked against calculation.",
      "heading": "Regular observation"
    },
    {
      "body": "Keep the observation separate from its interpretation. The record models the date and the astronomical note as one thing, and any omen reading or modern identification, such as an aurora, as another claim with its own argument.",
      "heading": "Try the research habit"
    },
    {
      "body": "If a modern study identifies an ancient entry as an aurora, what would make you confident: the wording, the date, the geomagnetic context, or all three? Which is weakest?",
      "heading": "A question to carry forward"
    }
  ],
  "short_title": "What did someone see in 652 BCE?",
  "slug": "astronomical-diaries-a-dated-record-of-the-babylonian-sky",
  "summary": "Enter the Babylonian Astronomical Diaries through a single tablet, BM 32312, and learn why a dated observation is kept apart from what it was taken to mean.",
  "tags": [
    "Astronomical Diaries",
    "Babylon",
    "Observation",
    "Aurora"
  ],
  "title": "Astronomical Diaries: a dated record of the Babylonian sky."
}