[Q]jyoti.h'saastra - what is "catarchic"?

[Dominik Wujastyk]

On Fri, 17 May 1996, Birgit Kellner wrote:

> At 20:01 96/05/16 BST, Gary Tubb wrote:
[...]
> >David Pingree's _Jyotihsastra: Astral and Mathematical Literature_,
> >which is Volume 6, Fascicle 4 in Gonda's _History of Indian Literature_
> >(Wiesbaden 1981).
>
> .. which is exactly where the question came from. However, Pingree uses the
> word very rarely, and in a way which renders it impossible to actually guess
> the meaning.

Gary and I were discussing some of David's writing at the weekend, and
Gary made the very good point that David takes it for granted in much of
what he writes that the reader is thoroughly familiar with the content of
Otto Neugebauer's book _The Exact Sciences in Antiquity_.  It's a
reasonable assumption too, in my view.  If someone is interested in the
history of Indian astral sciences, it should go without saying that they
would read generally about the history of astronomy in the ancient world,
and Neugebauer's book is a classic in this area.  It is also rather short
(though meaty), which is always nice in a technical book. :-)

--
Dominik Wujastyk