Episode 1: The Sky's The Limit

Since the dawn of modern humans more than 100,000 years ago, people have been looking into the sky in wonder. They have marvelled at the regularity of the life-giving Sun, the changing phases of the Moon, the motions of planets and comets and the mysterious starry backdrop of the cosmos. They have mapped and measured the heavens and slowly come to understand what they represent. The task is by no means over. By following the progress of astronomy through the ages, Heather Couper outlines the history of ideas and the rise of science.

Einstein said that 'imagination is more important than knowledge' and this series emphasises the sheer poetry of the heavens. Whilst our understanding is built on centuries of accurate observations and measurements, it is inspiring on occasion to stand in silence and look with awe and wonder at the night sky.

Episode 2: Cathedrals of the Cosmos.

Megalithic calendars and the solar year. In ancient times, our ancestor's calendar was agricultural. The rising and setting of the Sun dominated people's lives and they were dependent on the seasons for their livelihoods. As the days grew shorter and the northern winter approached, it must sometimes have felt as if summer would never return. They built stone calendars aligned to the solar year. The orientation of stone circles such as Stonehenge and underground tombs such as Newgrange in Ireland may have been to mark the midwinter solstice and pray for the Sun's return rather than to celebrate midsummer.

Episode 3: Stories of the sky.

Origins of the constellations, and constellation legends. Our ancestors mapped the stories of their mythology onto the constellations in the sky. For Australian aboriginals, the rich blizzard of stars that forms the milky way has been a record of their dreamtime stories perhaps for 40,000 years. The stars' position overhead told them the best time to hunt for emu's eggs.

In the Andes, the clarity of the Pleiades star cluster gave the climate clues for the best time to plant potatoes and in ancient Egypt, the rising of the dog star, Sirius heralded floods along the Nile. Even today, the ancient sky stories make good tales.

Episode 4. Mirror of The Earth

The Chinese astronomical bureaucracy. It is the nature of the human mind to search for the causes of things and to apportion blame on external events. So it was that in ancient civilisations, from Babylon to China, events in the sky were linked with what would otherwise seem to be random natural disasters and good or bad fortune. In ancient China the sky really did seem to be the Mirror of the Earth.

Astrology developed not as a means of guiding individuals in their love life and fortunes but of advising rulers on their military campaigns. Emperors turned to their astrologers for explanations and the only place the astrologers could look was to the heavens. But their monitoring of the skies gave rise to some of the earliest accurate astronomical records, recording eclipses, comets and exploding stars thousands of years before our scientific era.

Episode 5:Three Wise Men.

Ancient Astronomy and the star of Bethlehem. A little over 2000 years ago, it is said, three Wise men from the East followed astronomical signs which led them to a stable in Bethlehem. So who were these men and what were the astronomical traditions that gave rise to the story of the star of Bethlehem? That the 'star' was not recorded by Chinese astrologers nor noticed by King Herod and his advisers suggests that it was not a comet or a supernova. Perhaps it was a particular conjunction of planets which led Persian astrologers to precise predictions rather than a brilliant celestial orb that hovered above a stable.

From ancient Babylonian times, different stars and planets had been associated with different deities and, through them, with events and nations on Earth. Through Babylonian and Egyptian astrology came the basis of modern mathematics and the division of the sky -- and the day -- into 24 hours.

Friday 30th May 9.00pm - Omnibus edition

A special edition based on the this week's programmes.