Mercury (planet) three weeks, the Sun is almost stationary overhead, and is at its most brilliant because Mercury is at perihelion, its closest to the Sun. This prolonged exposure to the Sun at its brightest makes these two points the hottest places on Mercury. Conversely, there are two other points on the equator, 90 degrees of longitude apart from the first ones, where the Sun passes overhead only when the planet is at aphelion in alternate years, when the apparent motion of the Sun in Mercury's sky is relatively rapid. These points, which are the ones on the equator where the apparent
The empire on which the sun never sets the sun encircles.” Mesopotamian texts contemporary to Sargon of Akkad (c. 2334 – 2279 BC) proclaim that this king ruled “all the lands from sunrise to sunset.” In the early 16th century, the phrase, ""el imperio en el que nunca se pone el sol"" ("the empire on which the sun never sets") originated with a remark made by Fray Francisco de Ugalde to Charles I, who as king of Spain and as Holy Roman Emperor by the name of Charles V, had an empire, which included many territories in Europe, islands in the Mediterranean and Atlantic, cities in North Africa