Eise Eisinga Planetarium

Between 1774 and 1781 Eise Eisinga built a solar system model into his living room ceiling in the province of Friesland, The Netherlands.

All the planets in Eisinga’s model orbit the sun at the same speed as do the real planets: Mercury in 88 days, the earth in one year, and Saturn in more than 29 years. It is the oldest still-working model—he left drawings explanations and instructions, including:

• Don’t forget to set the date ring correctly on the leap day.
• Check the speed of the clock during sudden temperature changes.
• Adjust the orbit of Saturn every year because I made a little miscalculation.
• Don’t forget to paint new year numbers every 22 years.

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