Did you know that the fans of science fiction owe the greatest thanks to an incorrectly translated Italian word around the 1800s?
In the year 1877, an Italian astronomer by the name of Giovanni Schiaparelli was observing Mars with his newly improved refractor telescope in Milan. He decided to map the Mars surface and ended up naming Martian โcontinentsโ and โseasโ using historic and mythological sources. It was the first ever detailed map of Mars and a lot of terminology from it is still in use.
Anyway, Mr. Schiaparelli was having a look and noticed too many channels, rather a network of them, on Mars surface. He called them โcanaliโ, which is the Italian word for channels. All this man wanted was to give a befitting name to an observed feature on the natural configuration of a planetary surface. Today, high-resolution mapping has shown that no such structures actually exist and theseย canaliย were probably the result of some optical illusion or less advance technology. Anyway, the key takeaway here is that this was merely an observed feature on Mars by him.
(Mars map byย Schiaparelli in 1877)
The mapping of Mars surface was a pretty big deal at that time and for good reason. His map was translated to several languages, English among the most prominent ones. Thus, โCanaliโ that referred to marks and grooves was mistranslated to โcanalโ, which is the name for human-made channels for water transportation and thus pointed to intelligent life on Mars. The recent construction of theย Suez Canalย in 1869 (an engineering marvel of the era) drove the above idea pretty quickly into people’s heads.
In fact, in the year 1894, a Boston astronomer Percival Lowel made his first observations of Mars and owing to what can now be understood as a confirmation bias, he concluded that the canals were real! He even mapped hundreds of them and theorised that the straight lines were artificial canals built by intelligent Martians to carry water from polar caps to equatorial regions.
His theories went on to influence a young English writer named H. G. Wells, who publishedย The War of the Worldsย four years later. The novel is about an invasion of Earth by Martians and it launched a whole new genre of alien science fiction. We have this followed by the likes ofย A Princess of Mars seriesย by Edgar R. Burroughs who even used Schiaparelliโs names for regions of Mars. This went on and on with dozens of books and stories published every subsequent year for a while based on Martians.
On Halloween in 1938, a radio version of The War of the Worlds was broadcast by Orson Welles and The Mercury Theatre. The story, presented as a series of “live” news bulletins, actually panicked thousands of listeners who believed that America was being attacked by hostile Martians!
As for the โMartian canalsโ that started it all? Nobody saw them ever and for one reason. They donโt exist! It was all a crazy case of confirmation bias and apophenia. While the truth was all straightened out soon enough with scientific advancement, it all worked in the favour of science fiction fans. Well, all’s well that ends well ๐
Sources:
NASA- The ‘Canali’ and the First Martians
A Short History of Martian Canals and Mars Fever
The “Canals” of Mars: How Giovanni Schiaparelli Saw Tharsis
Tracing the Canals of Mars: An Astronomer’s Obsession
The Canals of Mars
Hey Neha,
Can I find you on Messenger??…
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Messenger as in the Facebook one? Because I don’t use Facebook much. Why don’t you share your email address and we can correspond much comfortably over there?
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I don’t use email much, that’s why.. ๐๐๐๐๐……
Btw, this is my email : [email protected]
Come there. ๐ค๐ค..
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Check your mail ๐
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Wow. Interesting. The amount of research you put in is amazing.
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Thank you, Lavanya! So glad you liked this one ๐
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Neha, I know look forward to your interesting fact blog. I learned a new thing and that too with smiles. Stay charming and gorgeous ๐ธ๐ธ
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Thanks for such a lovely comment, Shantanu. I am on a spree to bring all my Quora answers over here. I am happy that you find them interesting ๐
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Oh brilliant. Quora is fascinating
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Quora is pretty awesome, just that after a while, you want to write on your own independent ideas instead of provided questions. So I had to move on from there. It is still my go-to place for interesting ideas alongside WordPress ๐
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Agreed. I need to try my hands on it.
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๐
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Very interesting post dear.
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Thank you ๐
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I could go and tell this to my Book Club members today! And bask in the glory ๐
That’s some information Neha. I wonder if the interpretation would be different how would science fiction be today
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Haha I am glad it could be of some use to you ๐
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Nice article and well timed since Mars is nearly at opposition. It’s the bright red star that’s out all night.
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Haha it is. Thanks for reading. So glad you liked it ๐
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That is fascinating how you connected all this!
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Thank you ๐
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Ah, this was a very interesting read, thank you for posting it.
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Thanks a lot. So glad you found it interesting ๐
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You are welcome.
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Haha I really like science fiction! ๐
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Oh yay! Me too ๐ ๐
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Great post, really interesting.
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Thanks for reading. Glad you liked it ๐
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Wow!! Never knew this. Great knowledge.
Thanks
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Glad you liked it ๐
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Wow! thank you so much for sharing this post!!!! loved all of it!!
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I am glad you liked it ๐
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So interesting. Thank you, Neha. Good to bond with you here , somehow.
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I am glad I came across your blog โค
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Thank you ๐ I am so honored.
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โค
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Reblogged this on A way with words..
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Thanks a lot, Chris. It means so much ๐
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Didn’t know that! Interesting fact and thanks for enlightening me…. ๐ โค
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And thank you for reading it ๐ ๐
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Pleasure… ๐
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Reblogged this on BeTranslated.
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