This summer, a total solar eclipse will cross the United States from coast to coast for the first time in a century.
Thousands of people are flocking to the path of totality, the area where it will be possible to see the Moon entirely cover up the Sun.
There will be music festivals and huge crowds.
A Kentucky town even rebranded itself as "Eclipseville." But what can eclipses actually teach us about our place in the solar system?
People have tracked eclipses since the dawn of civilization.
Many cultures thought they were bad omens and developed all kinds of myths to explain them.
In ancient China, people believed a solar eclipse occurred when a sky dragon devoured the Sun, and their word for "eclipse" came from the word "to eat." In West Africa, some people believed eclipses happened when the Sun and Moon were fighting and viewed the event as a time to resolve old feuds.
By the early Renaissance, astronomers began to investigate the science behind eclipses.
Nicolaus Copernicus saw four solar eclipses in his lifetime.
His observations through a camera obscura helped him develop the theory that the Sun was at the center of the solar system, not the Earth.
