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The Gold Medal is the highest award of the Royal Astronomical Society.

In the early years, more than one medal was often awarded in a year, but by 1833 only one medal was being awarded per year. This caused a problem when Neptune was discovered in 1846, because many felt an award should jointly be made to John Couch Adams and Urbain Le Verrier. A controversy arose and no award was made in 1847.

The controversy was "resolved" by giving 12 "testimonial" awards in 1848 to various people including Adams and Le Verrier, and in 1849 awards resumed, with a limit of one per year. Adams and Le Verrier did not get their gold medals until 1866 and 1868, respectively. Adams, as President, presented Le Verrier with the medal.

The practice of awarding one medal a year continued until 1963, although two medals were awarded in both 1867 and 1886 and in a few years no award was made. Since 1964 there have been two awards in most years, one for astronomy and one for geophysics.

Contents 1 Recipients 2 Silver medals 3 "Testimonial" medals of 1848 4 See also 5 External links

• 1824, Charles Babbage, Johann Franz Encke
• 1826, John Herschel, James South, Wilhelm Struve
• 1827, Francis Baily
• 1828, Sir Thomas Makdougall Brisbane, James Dunlop, Caroline Herschel
• 1829, Rev. William Pearson, Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel, Heinrich Christian Schumacher
• 1830, William Richardson, Johann Franz Encke
• 1831, Captain Henry Kater, Baron Marie-Charles Damoiseau
• 1833, George Biddell Airy
• 1835, Lieut. Manuel J. Johnson
• 1836, John Herschel
• 1837, Otto A. Rosenberger
• 1839, The Hon. John Wrottesley
• 1840, Giovanni Plana
• 1841, Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel
• 1842, Peter Andreas Hansen
• 1843, Francis Baily
• 1845, Captain William Henry Smyth
• 1846, George Biddell Airy
• 1849, William Lassell
• 1850, Otto Wilhelm Struve
• 1851, Annibale de Gasparis
• 1852, Christian August Friedrich Peters
• 1853, John Russell Hind
• 1854, Charles Rümker
• 1855, William Rutter Dawes
• 1856, Robert Grant
• 1857, Heinrich Schwabe
• 1858, The Rev. Robert Main
• 1859, Richard Christopher Carrington
• 1860, Peter Andreas Hansen
• 1861, Hermann Goldschmidt
• 1862, Warren de la Rue
• 1863, Friedrich Wilhelm Argelander
• 1865, George Phillips Bond
• 1866, John Couch Adams
• 1867, William Huggins, William Allen Miller
• 1868, Urbain Le Verrier
• 1869, Edward James Stone
• 1870, Charles Delaunay
• 1872, Giovanni Schiaparelli
• 1874, Simon Newcomb
• 1875, Heinrich d'Arrest
• 1876, Urbain Le Verrier
• 1878, Baron Ercole Dembowski
• 1879, Asaph Hall
• 1881, Axel Möller
• 1882, David Gill
• 1883, Benjamin A. Gould
• 1884, Andrew Ainslie Common
• 1885, William Huggins
• 1886, Edward Charles Pickering, Charles Pritchard
• 1887, George William Hill
• 1888, Arthur Auwers
• 1889, Maurice Loewy
• 1892, George Howard Darwin
• 1893, Hermann Carl Vogel
• 1894, S. W. Burnham
• 1895, Isaac Roberts
• 1896, Seth Carlo Chandler
• 1897, Edward Emerson Barnard
• 1898, William Frederick Denning
• 1899, Frank McClean
• 1900, Henri Poincaré
• 1901, Edward Charles Pickering
• 1902, Jacobus Kapteyn
• 1903, Hermann Struve
• 1904, George Ellery Hale
• 1905, Lewis Boss
• 1906, William Wallace Campbell
• 1907, Ernest William Brown
• 1908, Sir David Gill
• 1909, Oskar Backlund
• 1910, Friedrich Küstner
• 1911, Philip Herbert Cowell
• 1912, Arthur Robert Hinks
• 1913, Henri-Alexandre Deslandres
• 1914, Max Wolf
• 1915, Alfred Fowler
• 1916, John L. E. Dreyer
• 1917, Walter Sydney Adams
• 1918, John Evershed
• 1919, Guillaume Bigourdan
• 1921, Henry Norris Russell
• 1922, James Hopwood Jeans
• 1923, Albert A. Michelson
• 1924, Arthur Eddington
• 1925, Sir Frank Watson Dyson
• 1926, Albert Einstein
• 1927, Frank Schlesinger
• 1928, Ralph Allen Sampson
• 1929, Ejnar Hertzsprung
• 1930, John Stanley Plaskett
• 1931, Willem de Sitter
• 1932, Robert Grant Aitken
• 1933, Vesto Slipher
• 1934, Harlow Shapley
• 1935, E. Arthur Milne
• 1936, Hisashi Kimura
• 1937, Harold Jeffreys
• 1938, William Hammond Wright
• 1939, Bernard Lyot
• 1940, Edwin Hubble
• 1943, Harold Spencer Jones
• 1944, Otto Struve
• 1945, Bengt Edlen
• 1946, Jan Oort
• 1947, Marcel Minnaert
• 1948, Bertil Lindblad
• 1949, Sydney Chapman
• 1950, Joel Stebbins
• 1951, Anton Pannekoek
• 1952, John Jackson
• 1953, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
• 1954, Walter Baade
• 1955, Dirk Brouwer
• 1956, Thomas George Cowling
• 1957, Albrecht Unsöld
• 1958, André Danjon
• 1959, Raymond Arthur Lyttleton
• 1960, Viktor Ambartsumian
• 1961, Herman Zanstra
• 1962, Bengt Strömgren
• 1963, H. H. Plaskett
• 1964, Martin Ryle, Maurice Ewing
• 1965, Edward Bullard, Gerald Maurice Clemence
• 1966, Ira S. Bowen, Harold C. Urey
• 1967, Hannes Alfven, Allan Sandage
• 1968, Sir Fred Hoyle, Walter Munk
• 1969, A. T. Price, Martin Schwarzschild
• 1970, Horace W. Babcock
• 1971, F. Press, Sir Richard van der Riet Woolley
• 1972, H. I. S. Thirlaway, Fritz Zwicky
• 1973, F. Birch, Edwin Salpeter
• 1974, Ludwig Biermann, K. E. Bullen
• 1975, Jesse Greenstein, Ernst Öpik
• 1976, William H. McCrea, J. A. Ratcliffe
• 1977, D. R. Bates, John G. Bolton
• 1978, Lyman Spitzer, James Van Allen
• 1979, L. Knopoff, C. G. Wynne
• 1980, C. L. Pekeris, Maarten Schmidt
• 1981, J. F. Gilbert, Sir Bernard Lovell
• 1982, Riccardo Giacconi, Sir Harrie Massey
• 1983, M. J. Seaton, Fred Whipple
• 1984, S. K. Runcorn, Yakov Borisovich Zel'dovich
• 1985, Thomas Gold, Stephen Hawking
• 1986, G. E. Backus, A. Dalgarno
• 1987, Takesi Nagata, Martin Rees
• 1988, D. L. Anderson, C. de Jager
• 1989, R. Hide, K. A. Pounds
• 1990, J. W. Dungey, B. E. J. Pagel
• 1991, Vitaly Ginzburg, G. J. Wasserburg
• 1992, D. P. McKenzie, Eugene N. Parker
• 1993, Peter Goldreich, Donald Lynden-Bell
• 1994, James E. Gunn, T. R. Kaiser
• 1995, J. Houghton, Rashid Sunyaev
• 1996, K. Creer, Vera Rubin
• 1997, D. Farley, Donald Osterbrock
• 1998, R. L. Parker, James Peebles
• 1999, K. Budden, Bohdan Paczynski
• 2000, L. Lucy, R. Hutchinson
• 2001, Hermann Bondi, H. Rishbeth
• 2002, Leon Mestel, J. A. Jacobs
• 2003, John Bahcall, D. Gubbins
• 2004, Jeremiah P. Ostriker, Grenville Turner
• 2005, Margaret Burbidge, Geoffrey Burbidge, Carole Jordan
• 2006, Simon White, S. W. H. Cowley

On two occasions, silver medals were also awarded, but this was soon discontinued.

• 1824 Charles Rümker, Jean-Louis Pons
• 1827 William Samuel Stratford, Col. Mark Beaufoy

• George Biddell Airy
• John Couch Adams
• Friedrich Wilhelm Argelander
• George Bishop
• Lt-Col. George Everest
• Sir John Herschel
• Peter Andreas Hansen
• Karl Ludwig Hencke
• John Russell Hind
• Urbain Le Verrier
• Sir John William Lubbock
• Maxmilian Weisse

• Royal Astronomical Society

• List of recipients