feb 28, 1877 - Giovanni Schiaparelli’s 1877 announcement

Description:

In 1877, Giovanni Virginio Schiaparelli , director of the Brera Observatory in Milan, began mapping and naming areas on Mars.
He named the Martian "seas" and "continents" (dark and light areas) with names from historic and mythological sources. He saw channels on Mars and called them "canali." Canali means channels, but it was mistranslated into "canals" implying intelligent life on Mars.