Tom wrote:Neptune was apparently making its station at this time before turning retrograde, and Galileo would not have noticed any motion.

I had a look in Jean Meeus' book I had mentioned and it is stated that this 'star' wasn't identified as Neptune until 1980! This illustrates what a blessing the computerprograms of ephemerides can be for checking observations in the past. If Galileo would have discovered that this 'star' was moving, I'm afraid he probably wouldn't have been able to find it again after conjunction with the Sun.

Andrew Bevan wrote:Both Uranus and Neptune are quite a disappointment. They may be identified, but that is about it. Those astronomers must surely have been a band of eccentrics. At any rate it is a wonder they managed to perform half the work that they actually did.

Seen through a telescope they are indeed nothing more than a tiny bluish/greenish dot, visible as a star or only as a tiny disc with bigger magnifications. Compared with the brighter and bigger former two 'farthest' planets Jupiter and Saturn it makes one doubt if they should be used in astrology at all.