Ptolemy

American  

[tol-uh-mee] / ˈtɒl ə mi /

noun

• Ptolemies
  plural

1. Claudius Ptolemaeus, flourished a.d. 127–151, Hellenistic mathematician, astronomer, and geographer in Alexandria.

2. any of the kings of the Macedonian dynasty that ruled Egypt 323–30 b.c.

---

Ptolemy British  

/ ˈtɒlɪmɪ /

noun

1. Latin name Claudius Ptolemaeus. 2nd century _ad , Greek astronomer, mathematician, and geographer. His Geography was the standard geographical textbook until the discoveries of the 15th century. His system of astronomy (see Ptolemaic system ), as expounded in the Almagest, remained undisputed until the Copernican system was evolved

---

Ptolemy Scientific  

/ tŏl′ə-mē /

1. Greek astronomer and mathematician who based his astronomy on the belief that all heavenly bodies revolved around Earth. Ptolemy's model of the solar system endured until the 16th century when Nicolaus Copernicus proposed that the heavenly bodies in the solar system orbited the Sun.

---

Ptolemy ¹ Cultural  

1. An ancient Greek astronomer, living in Egypt (see also Egypt), who proposed a way of calculating the movements of the planets on the assumption that they, along with the sun and the stars, revolved around the Earth. (See Ptolemaic universe.)

---

Ptolemy ² Cultural  

1. An ancient Greek astronomer, living in Egypt (see also Egypt), who proposed a way of calculating the movements of the planets on the assumption that they, along with the sun and the stars, were embedded in clear spheres that revolved around the Earth. The system of Ptolemy, called the Ptolemaic universe, prevailed in astronomy for nearly fifteen hundred years, until the modern model of the solar system, with the sun at the center and the planets in motion, was developed from the ideas of Copernicus.

---

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• Ptolemies
  plural

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Ptolemy Ptolemies

Memorable figures include the town barber and perpetual bachelor, Jayber Crow, and the Falstaffian 300-pound farmer Ptolemy Proudfoot, who lives happily with his diminutive wife, Miss Minnie.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 23, 2025

When he examined the map, he saw the figure was actually an homage to the 2nd century geographer Ptolemy.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 25, 2023

Clausen believes the chart’s author conflated Ptolemy with a dynasty of Greek kings who had ruled Egypt.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 25, 2023

A few centuries later, another Greek astronomer, Ptolemy, attempted to classify stars using a six-tier scale, assigning the brightest stars to the first tier and the faintest ones to the sixth.

From Scientific American ● Jul. 28, 2023

The end of the Ptolemy cartouche means “Ever-living, beloved of the god Ptah.”

From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan

Once they cemented their control, the Ptolemies were able to simply act as pharaohs, despite remaining ethnically and linguistically Macedonian Greek.

From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2020

The Jews also struggled with their Greek overlords, a problem exacerbated by the fact that they were ruled first by the Ptolemies and then by the Seleucids.

From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2020

It was from the Ptolemies that the tube-blown glassmaking techniques we see today derive.

From Slate ● Jul. 29, 2019

But few would disagree that the Europe of Charlemagne was more backward in its mindset, at least at the elite level, than the Rome of Augustus or the Alexandria of the Ptolemies.

From Salon ● Jan. 18, 2011

The Ptolemies also promoted immigration from elsewhere in the Greek world, offering direct economic rewards as well as the material comforts of a lavish foundation where no expense was spared.

From "Circumference" by Nicholas Nicastro