The study of the night sky is probably older than civilisation, for the gods lived in the skies. The origins of astronomy can be found in Mesopotamia with the Sumerians, whose knowledge passed to and was developed by the Babylonians. Their ideas were then accepted by the Greeks, who were responsible for a number of key advances in astronomy, the most impressive of which so far discovered was the 'Antikythera Mechanism'. Found in a shipwreck, this device was an early analogue computer used to track the movement of the planets. Until its discovery in 1900 it was believed the first device of this kind hadn’t been invented until the 14th century.
