“Certainly,” Gingerich says, “Ptolemy did not commit fraud. And his great contribution of the geocentric theory,” he adds, “was the true testament to Ptolemy’s greatness as an astronomer.

Now researchers have managed to recover the text written by Ptolemy on a parchment that suffered such a previous recovery attempt. Outermost six rings of the meteoroscope, not to scale.

Suddenly left without his trusted caretaker, Ptolemy Grey is assigned to the care of orphaned teenager Robyn. When they learn about a treatment that will restore Ptolemy’s dementia-addled ...