document: Scientists missed by 150 years in dating the oldest known reliable record of a total solar eclipse , a clay tablet that also reflects fear among the ancient observers , researchers said today . Scientists had concluded about 20 years ago that the eclipse , recorded on a clay tablet found in Syria , occurred on May 3 , 1375 B.C. . But in today 's issue of the British journal Nature , two Dutch scientists report their analysis shows the eclipse really happened about 150 years later , on March 5 , 1223 B.C. . The tablet was found in 1948 in the ruins of Ugarit , an ancient city near Syria 's Mediterranean coast . One side appears to tell of a solar eclipse , and the reverse side reads , `` Two livers were examined : danger . '' `` Apparently the anxiety caused by the eclipse of the Sun and the sudden appearance of Mars had to be resolved by an explanation through liver divination , '' wrote the researchers from the University of Amsterdam and Leiden University . They concluded that the earlier text analysis of the tablet misidentified the time of year in which the eclipse occurred . The new study indicated the eclipse really happened in late February or early March . In addition , the text apparently indicates that Mars was visible at the time of the eclipse , the Dutch researchers said . They compared those criteria and the likely age range for the tablet to a list of possible total solar eclipses visible from Ugarit . Only the event in 1223 B.C. fills the bill , the researchers said . In an accompanying editorial , Christopher B.F. Walker of the British Museum in London cautioned that their conclusion `` can best be regarded as a plausible hypothesis . '' The translation of the tablet 's text is not certain , and the study assumes that citizens of Ugarit followed an Egyptian-style calendar , for which no supporting evidence is available , he said . Even if the tablet is 150 years younger than previously believed , it would remain the oldest known reliable record of a total solar eclipse , Edwin Krupp , director of the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles , said in a telephone interview . The next-oldest record was made in China in the Eighth Century B.C. , said Krupp , a researcher in ancient astronomy .
extractive_keyphrases: solar eclipses clay tablet dutch scientists syria reliable record ancient observers