Get to the root of it
Mapping the Moon
Moon as seen without a telescope
Courtesy Lucy Albert When you look at the Moon without a telescope, it looks like a smooth, gray-and-white ball.
Drawing by Galileo, 1610
Galileo used his small telescopes to discover that the surface of the Moon
had bright and dark points that must mean the presence of heights and depths — mountains,
craters, and plains. This drawing of the half-Moon phase shows the jagged
shadow caused by different elevations.
Hevelius’ telescope could see much more detail than could previous telescopes. He saw mountains on the Moon, for example, and was able to estimate their heights. With his skill at drawing and his attention to detail, he created extremely intricate maps. The images below are from his 1647 atlas of the Moon, the Selenographia.
Courtesy the United States Naval Observatory 
