Tolkien's Influence Galactic?

[Mithalwen]

Originally Posted by Legate of Amon Lanc

Although Tolkien's use of astronomy was possibly more in "poetic" than "physics" terms, I agree with you. It is really interesting... but it does not end with "hobbit" galaxies: I know about an asteroid named Bilbo... There is even an asteroid named Tolkien! I'm quite sure the Professor would be pleased...

Well to be fair, Tolkien was unlikely to have had much scientific education himself and there has been quite a lot of progress since his day but this article which someone directed me to on another thread a while back, may be of interest.

Having live so long with light pollution it took the blessed chance of waking in the small hours during a rail journey across the Australian outback to become aware of the full glory of a starlit night (and truly "get" the Elvish wonderment at it). It inspired me to take a course but having myself opted for poetry over Physics at 16 I struggled a bit . I wonder if the stars would have been so important in Tolkien's middle earth had he not lived in his youth, at least in lands of dark skies.

While the use of names from Classical Mythology for planets and their moons is long standing, it really is quite an achievement for an invented mythology to have entered the collective consciousness to be used usefully. Splendid news...