David W. Pankenier is Professor of Chinese at Lehigh University, Pennsylvania. His current research interests range from the history of ideas in early China, to archaeoastronomy and cultural astronomy. He is particularly interested in the connection between rare astronomical phenomena and epoch-making political and military events in ancient China.

Introduction; Part I. Astronomy and Cosmology in the Time of Dragons: 1. Astronomy begins at Taosi; 2. Watching for dragons; Part II. Aligning with Heaven: 3. Looking to the supernal lord; 4. Bringing heaven down to earth; 5. Astral revelation and the origins of writing; Part III. Planetary Omens and Cosmic Ideology: 6. The cosmo-political mandate; 7. The rhetoric of the supernal; 8. Cosmology and the calendar; Part IV. Warring States and Han Astral Portentology: 9. Astral prognostication and the battle of Chengpu; 10. A new astrological paradigm; Part V. One with the Sky: 11. Cosmic capitals; 12. Temporality and the fabric of space-time; 13. The sky river and cosmography; 14. Planetary portentology east and west; Epilogue; Appendix. Astrology for an empire: the 'treatise on the celestial offices' in The Grand Scribe's Records (c.100 BCE); Glossary; Index.