This book surveys how humans across Eurasia depicted their knowledge of
the heavens over a period of nearly 4,000 years. Frequently focusing on
enigmatic objects, the authors present a wide variety of objects -
through text and pictures - from tombs, churches, temples, caves,
museums, libraries and even a bathroom. Analyzing and contextualizing
the objects and their astral imageries, the authors narrate what the
producers and users of these images knew about the heavens and how they
shaped their relationships to them through the objects presented. Among
the images treated in the chapters we find planetary and celestial
deities (Egypt, Rome, India, Japan), the seven-day-week (Rome, Tibet,
Japan), constellations and zodiacal signs (Mesopotamia, the Islamic
world, Europe), the Sun and the Moon (Sasanian Iran, northern China,
Islamic Iraq), scholars, muses and globes (ancient Greece), power and
politics (Rome, Italy), and a dancing goat (Iran).
