| From: Thomas Hockey et al. (eds.). The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers, Springer Reference. New York: Springer, 2007, p. 609 |
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Courtesy of 
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Kamalākara
Narahari Achar
Born Vārāṇasī,
(Uttar Pradesh, India), circa 1608
Kamalākara
was born into a learned family of scholars from Golagrāma, a village
on the northern bank of the river Godāvarī. Kamalākara was
the second son of Nṛsiṁha, himself a scholar. His family
later moved to Vārāṇasī. Many members of Kamalākara's
family were illustrious astronomers, many of whom were also original discoverers.
All of them have contributed to the literature on astronomy. Kamalākara
learnt astronomy from his elder brother Divākara, who compiled five works
on astronomy. Kamalākara cites from Divākara's works.
Kamalākara's
major work, Siddhāntatattvaviveka, was compiled in Vārāṇasī
at about 1658 and has been published by Sudhākara Dvivedi in the Vārāṇasī series. This work consists
of 13 chapters in 3,024 verses in different meters and treats such topics
as mean positions and true positions of planets, shadows, elevation of the
Moon's cusps, rising and settings, eclipses, etc. Although this text
borrows heavily from Sūryasiddhānta, it contains some things
not found in other texts. For example, Kamalākara states that the pole
star we see at present is not exactly at the pole. He has assumed a value
of 60 units for the radius of the Earth and gives values for sines at 1° intervals.
Kamalākara also gives a table for finding the right ascension of a planet
from its longitude. According to D. Pingree, he presents the only Sanskrit
treatise on geometrical optics. His other works include Śeṣavāsanā and Sauravāsanā.
Kamalākara
was bitterly opposed to Munīśvara, the author of Siddhāntasārvabhauma.
Selected References
Kamalākara
(1885). Siddhāntatattvaviveka, edited with notes by Sudhākara
Dvivedi and Muralidhar Jha. Benaras Sanskrit Series, Vol. 1. Benaras.; 2nd
ed. 1924–1935. (Another edition is due to Gañgādhara Miśra, Lucknow,
1929.)
Pingree, David. Census of the Exact Sciences in Sanskrit.
Series A. Vol. 2 (1971): 21a–23a; Vol. 3 (1976): 18a; Vol. 4 (1981): 33a–33b;
Vol. 5 (1994): 22a. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.
——— (1981). Jyotiḥśāstra. Wiesbaden:
Otto Harrassowitz.