f68r: eclipse from 1419?

[Jorge_Stolfi]

I'm not even sure what method they would use to observe partial eclipses, was camera obscura known in Europe at the time?

During a partial eclipse the shadows of trees become quite remarkable: the white spots created by small gaps between leaves become crescent-shaped instead of circular.  

If that was not enough by itself, it should have inspired many to build their camera oscura.   All they needed was a small hole on the roof and a piece of paper on the floor.

Here is the camera oscura I improvised to watch the local partial eclipse of 2020-12-14:

           

It used a mirror that was actually a hard disk platter (which is very flat and smooth, and has no glass layer on top), covered with a paper sheet with a tiny hole on it.  The reflection from that tiny mirror was sent through a window into the living room, some 10-20 meters away.  Here is what the projection looked like before the eclipse started and at its maximum:

       

The image was not sharp enough to see sunspots and the like.  With a smaller pinhole on the mask the image would have been sharper but dimmer. 

All the best, --stolfi