Ptolemaic universe
[ (tol-uh-may-ik) ]
The model for the universe, put forth by the ancient Greek astronomer Ptolemy, that had the Earth at the center, with the sun, moon, planets, and stars revolving around it.
notes for Ptolemaic universe
The Ptolemaic system prevailed in
astronomy for nearly fifteen hundred years, until the model of the
solar system proposed by Nicolaus
Copernicus (with the sun, not the Earth, at the center) was accepted.
Church authorities forced
Galileo to declare belief in the Earth-centered universe.