Following the Stars: Images of the Zodiac in Islamic Art

The Following the Stars: Images of the Zodiac in Islamic Art catalogue accompanies an exhibition of the same name and follows the theme of astrology principally through objects from the late twelfth to fourteenth century in The Metropolitan Museum of Art's permanent collection. In the medieval Islamic world, the science of astrology was based on a knowledge of astronomy passed on the Arabs from Greek sources and consequently translated into Arabic. During the first centuries of Islam, it developed further, after the introduction of new observations and mathematical calculations, and the astonishing progress made in science, to which European culture would owe so much. The frescoes on the vaulted ceiling of the calidarium of the early eighth-century baths at Qusayr 'Amra—presently in the Jordanian desert east of the capital, Amman—which include the twelve constellations of the Zodiac, are a testimony to the interest that the first Islamic rulers evinced in the subject. Astrology became so popular it even affected the appearance of works of art, serving as a decorative device while, at the same time, imbuing the object with a powerful cosmological and talismanic significance. [This book was originally published in 1997 and has gone out of print. This edition is a print-on-demand version of the original book.]