The Chinese people have paid great attention to astronomical phenome-na since very early times. Meteor showers and solar eclipses which oc-curred as far back as in the Xia Dynasty(2070BC～1600BC) are recorded in ancient books, and are thought to be the earliest astronomical accounts in the world. By the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, astronomy had reached quite a high level of sophistication. Astronomers of the State of Lu obseNed 37 solar eclipl ses, among which 33 have been proved accurate. The earliest record of an ap-pearance by Halley's Comet (613 BC) is contained in the chronicle of Lu known as The Spring and Autumn, Annals .

During this period there appeared specialized works on astronomy.Based on their long-time observa-tion of the celestial phenomena, Gon De of the State of Chu wrote a work titled Astron,omy an,d Astrology in eight volumes, and Shi Shen of the State of Wei wrote his As-tronomy, also in eight volumes. The two works were combined later generations as The Gan,shi Classic of the Con,stellation,s.The earliest astronomical work extant in the world.

It recorded the motions of Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Mars and Saturn,and the rules dictating their appearances.It also recorded the names of 800 stars,of which the positions of 121 have been pinpointed.Gon De discovered Jupiter s moon with the naked eye, 2,000 years earlier than the Italian astronomer Galileo,who discovered it with an astronomical telescope in 1609. Shi Shen discovered the reason for solar and lunar eclipses. A crater on the moon has been named after Shi Shen.