ARYABHATA I
Aryabhata was the earliest Indian astronomer and mathematician whose work and history are available to modern' scholars. He is also known as Aryabhata the Elder or Aryabhata I to distinguish him from a 10th century Indian mathematician of the same, name.
His life and activities were centred around the city of Kusumapura, near Patliputra. He was closely related to the Gupta dynasty and Patliputra was its capital. The main literaryworks compiled by Aryabhata are Aryabhatiya and Aryabhatasiddhanta' which were circulated all over India. Written in verse couplets, this work deals with mathematics and astronomy. The work contains an elaborate introduction, astronomical tables, Aryabhata's system of phonemic number notation. The whole work is basically divided into three sections: Ganita (Mathematics), Kala-kriya
(Time Calculations), and Gola (Sphere).
Aryabhata deals with the numerous aspects of astronomy, giving more attention to treating planetary motion along the ecliptic. The book also throws light on various units of time, planetary lon- gitude corrections for different terrestrial locations, and a theory of "lords of the hours and days" (an astrological concept used for determining propitious times for action).
He also made prediction of solar and lunar eclipses. In his book he has madea very sensible statement that the apparent westward motion of the stars is due to the spherical Earth's rotation
about its axis. Aryabhata also correctly ascribed the luminosity of the Moon and planets to reflected sunlight. The Indian government named its first satellite Aryabhata (launched 1975) in his honour.
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