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Nicolaus Copernicus
Portrait from Toruń, 1580
Born	(1473-02-19)19 February 1473, Toruń (Thorn), Royal Prussia, Kingdom of Poland
Died	24 May 1543(1543-05-24) (aged 70), Frombork (Frauenburg), Prince-Bishopric of Warmia, Kingdom of Poland
Alma mater	Kraków University, Bologna University, University of Padua, University of Ferrara
Known for	Heliocentrism
Scientific career
Fields	Mathematics, astronomy, canon law, medicine, economics
Signature

Nicolaus Copernicus (19 February 1473 – 24 May 1543) was the first astronomer to formulate a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology, which displaced the Earth from the center of the universe.

Copernicus' epochal book, De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres), published just before his death in 1543, is often regarded as the starting point of modern astronomy and the defining epiphany that began the scientific revolution. His heliocentric model, with the Sun at the center of the universe, demonstrated that the observed motions of celestial objects can be explained without putting Earth at rest in the center of the universe. His work stimulated further scientific investigations, becoming a landmark in the history of science that is often referred to as the Copernican Revolution.

Among the great polymaths of the Renaissance, Copernicus was a mathematician, astronomer, physician, quadrilingual polyglot, classical scholar, translator, artist, Catholic cleric, jurist, governor, military leader, diplomat and economist. Among his many responsibilities, astronomy figured as little more than an avocation — yet it was in that field that he made his mark upon the world.

Life

Birthplace on St. Anne's Street (now Copernicus Street), Toruń

Nicolaus Copernicus was born on 19 February 1473 in the city of Toruń (Thorn) in Prusy Królewskie (Royal Prussia), a prowincja (Region) of the Kingdom of Poland.

His father was a merchant from Kraków and his mother was the daughter of a wealthy Toruń merchant. Nicolaus was the youngest of four children. His brother Andreas became an Augustinian canon at Frombork (Frauenburg). His sister Barbara, named after her mother, became a Benedictine nun. His sister Katharina married Barthel Gertner, a businessman and city councilor.

Copernicus never married or had children.

Father's family

The father’s family can be traced to a village in Silesia near Nysa (Neiße). The village's name has been variously spelled Kopernik, Köppernig, Köppernick, and today Koperniki. In the 14th century, members of the family began moving to various other Silesian cities, to the Polish capital, Kraków (1367), and to Toruń (1400). The father, likely the son of Jan, came from the Kraków line.

Nicolaus was named after his father, who appears in records for the first time as a well-to-do Roman Catholic merchant who dealt in copper, selling it mostly in Danzig (Gdańsk). He moved from Kraków to Toruń around 1458. Toruń, situated on the Vistula River, was at that time embroiled in the Thirteen Years' War (1454–66), in which the Kingdom of Poland, allied with Pomeranian cities, fought the Teutonic Order over control of the region. The father was actively engaged in the politics of the day, and he supported Poland and the cities against the Teutonic Order. In 1454 he mediated negotiations between Poland’s Cardinal Zbigniew Oleśnicki and the Pomeranian cities over repayment of war loans. In the Second Peace of Thorn (1466), the Teutonic Order formally relinquished all claims to Royal Prussia, which then remained a Region of Poland for the next 300 years.

The father married Barbara Watzenrode, the astronomer's mother, between 1461 and 1464. He died sometime between 1483 and 1485. Upon the father’s death, young Nicolaus’ maternal uncle, Lucas Watzenrode the Younger (1447–1512), took the boy under his protection and saw to his education and career.

Mother's family

Copernicus' maternal uncle, Lucas Watzenrode

Nicolaus’ mother, Barbara Watzenrode, was the daughter of Lucas Watzenrode the Elder and his wife Katherine (née Modlibóg). Not much is known about her life, but she is believed to have died when Nicolaus was a small boy. The Watzenrodes, who were Roman Catholic, had come from the Świdnica region of Silesia and had settled in Toruń after 1360, becoming prominent members of the city’s patrician class. Through the Watzenrodes' extensive family relationships by marriage, they were related to wealthy families of Toruń, Danzig and Elbląg (Elbing), and to the prominent Czapski, Działyński, Konopacki and Kościelecki noble families. The Modlibógs (literally, in Polish, "Pray to God") were a prominent Roman Catholic Polish family who had been well known in Poland's history since 1271. Lucas and Katherine had three children: Lucas Watzenrode the Younger, who would become Copernicus' patron; Barbara, the astronomer's mother; and Christina, who in 1459 married the merchant and mayor of Toruń, Tiedeman von Allen.

Lucas Watzenrode the Elder was well-regarded in Toruń as a devout man and honest merchant, and he was active politically. He was a decided opponent of the Teutonic Knights and an ally of Polish King Kazimierz IV Jagiellon. In 1453 he was the delegate from Toruń at the Grudziądz (Graudenz) conference that planned the Pomeranian cities’ alliance with Kazimierz and their subsequent war against the Teutonic Knights. During the Thirteen Years' War that ensued the following year, he actively supported the war effort with substantial monetary subsidies, with political activity in Toruń and Danzig, and by personally fighting in battles at Łasin and Marienburg. He died in 1462.

Lucas Watzenrode the Younger, the astronomer's maternal uncle and patron, was educated at the Kraków Academy (now Jagiellonian University) and at the universities of Cologne and Bologna. He was a bitter opponent of the Teutonic Order and its Grand Master, who once referred to Watzenrode as “the devil incarnate.” In 1489 Watzenrode was elected Bishop of Warmia against the wishes of King Kazimierz IV, who had hoped to install his own son in that seat. As a result, Watzenrode quarreled with the King until Kazimierz’s death three years later. Watzenrode was then able to form close relations with three successive Polish monarchs—Jan Olbracht, Alexander Jagiellon, and Zygmunt I. He was a friend and key advisor to each ruler, and his influence greatly strengthened the ties between Warmia and Poland proper. Watzenrode came to be considered the most powerful man in Warmia, and his wealth, connections and influence allowed him to secure Copernicus’ education and career as a canon at Frombork (Frauenberg) Cathedral.

Languages

Copernicus 1541 letter to Duke Albert of Prussia, giving medical advice for George von Kunheim

Copernicus spoke Latin, Polish, and German with equal fluency. He also spoke Greek and Italian. The vast majority of Copernicus’ surviving works are in Latin, which in his lifetime was the universal language of academia. Latin was also the official language of the Roman Catholic Church and of Poland's royal court, and thus all of Copernicus’ correspondence with the Church and with Polish leaders was in Latin.

A German-language correspondence between Copernicus and Duke Albert of Prussia has survived. Some German scholars assert that German should be considered Copernicus’ native language because Toruń was predominantly German-speaking, because a German-language correspondence has survived to illustrate his proficiency, and because, while studying law at Bologna in 1496, he signed into the German natio (Natio Germanorum), a student organization for German-speakers of all ethnicities, kingdoms and states.

Name

In Copernicus’ time, people were often called after the places where they lived. Like the Silesian village that inspired it, Copernicus’ family name has been spelled variously. Today the world primarily knows the astronomer by the Latinized version "Nicolaus Copernicus." In Poland he is called Mikołaj Kopernik. In Germany, the preferred version is Nikolaus Kopernikus.

The name likely had something to do with the local Silesian copper mining industry, though some Polish scholars assert that it may have been inspired by the dill plant (in Polish, "koperek" or "kopernik") that grows wild in Silesia.

As was to be the case with William Shakespeare a century later, numerous spelling variants of the name are documented for the astronomer and his relatives. The name first appeared as a place name in Silesia in the 13th century, where it was spelled variously in Latin documents. Copernicus "was rather indifferent about orthography. During his childhood, the name of his father (and thus of the future astronomer) was recorded in Toruń as Niclas Koppernigk around 1480. At Kraków he signed his name "Nicolaus Nicolai de Torunia." At Bologna in 1496, he registered in the Matricula Nobilissimi Germanorum Collegii resp. Annales Clarissimae Nacionis Germanorum of the Natio Germanica Bononiae as Dominus Nicolaus Kopperlingk de Thorn – IX grosseti. At Padua, Copernicus signed his name "Nicolaus Copernik", later as "Coppernicus." He signed a self-portrait, a copy of which is now at Jagiellonian University, "N Copernic." The astronomer Latinized his name to Coppernicus, generally with two "p"s (in 23 of 31 documents studied), but later in life he used a single "p". On the title page of De revolutionibus, Rheticus published the name as (in the genitive, or possessive, case) "Nicolai Copernici".

Education

Collegium Maius, Kraków

Nicolaus Copernicus Monument in Kraków

Copernicus' uncle seems first to have sent him to the St. John's School at Toruń where he himself had been a master. Later the boy attended the Cathedral School at Włocławek, up the Vistula River from Toruń, which prepared pupils for entrance to the Kraków Academy, in Poland's capital. In 1491 Copernicus enrolled in the Kraków Academy (now Jagiellonian University). It was there that he probably first encountered astronomy with Professor Albert Brudzewski. Astronomy soon fascinated him, and he began collecting a large library on the subject. Copernicus' library would later be carried off as war booty by the Swedes during the Deluge; it is now at the Uppsala University Library.

After four years in Kraków, followed by a brief stay back home in Toruń, Copernicus went to study law and medicine at the universities of Bologna and Padua. Copernicus' uncle, Lucas Watzenrode the Younger, financed his education. Copernicus, however, while studying canon and civil law at Bologna, met the famous astronomer, Domenico Maria Novara da Ferrara. Copernicus attended Novara's lectures and became his disciple and assistant. Copernicus published his first astronomical observations, made with Novara in 1497, in De revolutionibus.

In 1497 Watzenrode was ordained Bishop of Warmia, and Copernicus was named a canon at Frombork Cathedral. But Copernicus remained in Italy, where he attended the Jubilee of 1500. He also went to Rome, where he observed a lunar eclipse and gave lectures in astronomy and mathematics.

Copernicus returned to Frombork in 1501. As soon as he arrived, he obtained permission to complete his studies in Padua, where he studied medicine with Guarico and Girolamo Fracastoro, and at Ferrara, where he received a doctorate in canon law on 31 May 1503. One of the subjects that Copernicus must have studied was astrology, since it was considered an important part of a medical education. However, unlike most other prominent Renaissance astronomers, he appears never to have practiced or expressed any interest in astrology.

Work

On 10 January 1503, before obtaining his doctorate in canon law at Ferrara, Copernicus had received a sinecure at the Collegiate Church of the Holy Cross in Wrocław (Breslau), Silesia, Bohemia. He would hold this for many years before resigning it for health reasons shortly before his death.

In 1503, having completed all his studies in Italy, 30-year-old Copernicus returned to Warmia, where he would live out the remaining 40 years of his life. The Prince-Bishopric of Warmia enjoyed substantial autonomy, with its own diet, army, monetary unit (the same as in the other parts of Royal Prussia) and treasury.

Copernicus' tower at Frombork, where he lived and worked; rebuilt recently

Astronomer Copernicus: Conversation with God, by Matejko

From 1503 to 1510, or perhaps till his uncle's death (29 March 1512), Copernicus was his personal secretary and physician and resided in the Bishop's castle at Lidzbark Warmiński (Heilsberg). It is there that he began work on his heliocentric theory. In his official capacity, he took part in nearly all his uncle's political, ecclesiastic and administrative-economic duties. From the beginning of 1504, Copernicus accompanied Watzenrode to sessions of the Royal Prussian diet held at Malbork and Elbląg and, write Dobrzycki and Hajdukiewicz, "participated... in all the more important events in the complex diplomatic game that that ambitious politician and statesman played in defense of the particular interests of Prussia and Warmia, between hostility to the [Teutonic] Order and loyalty to the [Polish] Crown." In 1504–12 Copernicus made numerous journeys as part of his uncle's retinue—in 1504, to Toruń and Gdańsk (Danzig), to a session of the Royal Prussian Council in the presence of Poland's King Alexander Jagiellon; to sessions of the Prussian diet at Malbork (1506), Elbląg (1507) and Sztum (1512); and he may have attended a Poznań session (1510) and the coronation of Poland's King Sigismund I the Old in Kraków (1507). Watzenrode's itinerary suggests that in spring 1509 Copernicus may have attended the Kraków sejm.

It was probably on the latter occasion, in Kraków, that Copernicus submitted for printing at Jan Haller's press his translation, from Greek to Latin, of a collection, by the 7th-century Byzantine historian Theophylact Simocatta, of 85 brief poems called Epistles, or letters, supposed to have passed between various characters in a Greek story. They are of three kinds—"moral," offering advice on how people should live; "pastoral," giving little pictures of shepherd life; and "amorous," comprising love poems. They are arranged to follow one another in a regular rotation of subjects. Copernicus had translated the Greek verses into Latin prose, and he now published his version as Theophilacti scolastici Simocati epistolae morales, rurales et amatoriae interpretatione latina, which he dedicated to his uncle in gratitude for all the benefits he had received from him. With his translation, Copernicus declared himself on the side of the humanists in the struggle over the question whether Greek literature should be revived.

Some time before 1514, Copernicus wrote an initial outline of his heliocentric theory known only from later transcripts, by the title (perhaps given to it by a copyist), Nicolai Copernici de hypothesibus motuum coelestium a se constitutis commentariolus—commonly referred to as the Commentariolus. It was a succinct theoretical description of the world's heliocentric mechanism, without mathematical apparatus, and differed in some important details of geometric construction from De revolutionibus; but it was already based on the same assumptions regarding Earth's triple motions. The Commentariolus, which Copernicus consciously saw as merely a first sketch for his planned book, was not intended for printed distribution. He made only a very few manuscript copies available to his closest acquaintances, including, it seems, several Kraków astronomers with whom he collaborated in 1515–30 in observing eclipses. Tycho Brahe would include a fragment from the Commentariolus in his own treatise, Astronomiae instauratae progymnasmata, published in Prague in 1602, based on a manuscript that he had received from the Bohemian physician and astronomer Tadeáš Hájek, a friend of Rheticus. The Commentariolus would appear complete in print for the first time only in 1878.

In 1510 or 1512 Copernicus moved to Frombork, a town to the northwest at the Vistula Lagoon on the Baltic Sea coast. There, in April 1512, he participated in the election of Fabian of Lossainen as Prince-Bishop of Warmia. It was only in early June 1512 that the chapter gave Copernicus an "external curia"—a house outside the defensive walls of the cathedral mount. In 1514 he purchased the northwestern tower within the walls of the Frombork stronghold. He would maintain both these residences to the end of his life, despite the devastation of the chapter's buildings by a raid against Frombork carried out by the Teutonic Order in January 1520, during which Copernicus' astronomical instruments were probably destroyed. Copernicus conducted astronomical observations in 1513–16 presumably from his external curia; and in 1522–43, from an unidentified "small tower" (turricula), using primitive instruments modeled on ancient ones—the quadrant, triquetrum, armillary sphere. At Frombork Copernicus conducted over half of his more than 60 registered astronomical observations.

There he drew up a map of Warmia. His first poetic work was a Greek epigram, composed probably during a visit to Kraków, for Johannes Dantiscus' epithalamium for Barbara Zapolya's wedding to King Sigismund I the Old in 1512.

Olsztyn Castle

During 1516–21, Copernicus resided at Olsztyn Castle as economic administrator of Warmia, including Olsztyn (Allenstein) and Pieniężno (Mehlsack). While there, he wrote a manuscript, Locationes mansorum desertorum (Locations of Deserted Fiefs). When Olsztyn was besieged by the Teutonic Knights during the Polish–Teutonic War (1519–21), Copernicus was in charge of the defense of Olsztyn and Warmia by the Royal Polish forces. He also participated in the peace negotiations.

Copernicus worked for years with the Royal Prussian diet, and with Duke Albert of Prussia (against whom Copernicus had defended Warmia in the Polish-Teutonic War), and advised King Sigismund on monetary reform. He participated in discussions in the East Prussian diet about coinage reform in the Prussian countries. One question that concerned the diet was who had the right to mint coin. The matter required diplomacy, but was resolved successfully. Some difficulties were caused by political upheavals in Prussia at the time, including the establishment of the Duchy of Prussia as a Protestant state in 1525.

In 1526 Copernicus wrote a study on the value of money, Monetae cudendae ratio. In it he formulated an early iteration of the theory, now called Gresham's Law, that "bad" (debased) coinage drives "good" (un-debased) coinage out of circulation—70 years before Thomas Gresham. He also formulated a version of quantity theory of money. Copernicus' recommendations on monetary reform were widely read by leaders of both Prussia and Poland in their attempts to stabilize currency.

Thorvaldsen's Copernicus Monument in Warsaw

The 1533, Johann Widmanstetter, secretary to Pope Clement VII, explained Copernicus' heliocentric system to the Pope and two cardinals. The Pope was so pleased that he gave Widmanstetter a valuable gift.

In 1535 Bernard Wapowski wrote a letter to a gentleman in Vienna, urging him to publish an enclosed almanac, which he claimed had been written by Copernicus. This is the first and only mention of a Copernicus almanac in the historical records. The "almanac" was likely Copernicus' tables of planetary positions. Wapowski's letter mentions Copernicus' theory about the motions of the earth. Nothing came of Wapowski's request, because he died a couple of weeks later.

Following the death of Prince-Bishop of Warmia Mauritius Ferber (1 July 1537), Copernicus participated in the election of his successor, Johannes Dantiscus (20 September 1537). Copernicus was one of four candidates for the post, written in at the initiative of Tiedemann Giese; but his candidacy was actually pro forma, since Dantiscus had earlier been named coadjutor bishop to Ferber.

Copernicus with medicinal plant

At first Copernicus maintained friendly relations with the new Prince-Bishop, assisting him medically in spring 1538 and accompanying him that summer on an inspection tour of Chapter holdings. But that autumn, their friendship was strained by suspicions over Copernicus' housekeeper, Anna Schilling, whom Dantiscus removed from Frombork in 1539.

In his younger days, Copernicus the physician had treated his uncle, brother and other chapter members. In later years he was called upon to attend the elderly bishops who in turn occupied the see of Warmia—Mauritius Ferber and Johannes Dantiscus—and, in 1539, his old friend Tiedemann Giese, Bishop of Chełmno (Kulm). In treating such important patients, he sometimes sought consultations from other physicians, including the physician to Duke Albert and, by letter, the Polish Royal Physician.

In the spring of 1541, Duke Albert summoned Copernicus to Königsberg to attend the Duke's counselor, George von Kunheim, who had fallen seriously ill, and for whom the Prussian doctors seemed unable to do anything. Copernicus went willingly; he had met von Kunheim during negotiations over reform of the coinage. And Copernicus had come to feel that Albert himself was not such a bad person; the two had many intellectual interests in common. The Chapter readily gave Copernicus permission to go, as it wished to remain on good terms with the Duke, despite his Lutheran faith. In about a month the patient recovered, and Copernicus returned to Frombork. For a time, he continued to receive reports on von Kunheim's condition, and to send him medical advice by letter.

Throughout this period in his life, Copernicus continued to make astronomical observations and calculations, but only as his other responsibilities permitted and never in a professional capacity.

In 1551, eight years after Copernicus' death, astronomer Erasmus Reinhold published, under Duke Albert's sponsorship, the Prussian Tables, a set of astronomical tables based on Copernicus' work. Astronomers and astrologers quickly adopted it in place of its predecessors.

Heliocentrism

Some time before 1514 Copernicus made available to friends his "Commentariolus" ("Little Commentary"), a forty-page manuscript describing his ideas about the heliocentric hypothesis. It contained seven basic assumptions. Thereafter he continued gathering data for a more detailed work.

About 1532 Copernicus had basically completed his work on the manuscript of De revolutionibus orbium coelestium; but despite urging by his closest friends, he resisted openly publishing his views, not wishing—as he confessed—to risk the scorn "to which he would expose himself on account of the novelty and incomprehensibility of his theses."

In 1533, Johann Albrecht Widmannstetter delivered a series of lectures in Rome outlining Copernicus' theory. Pope Clement VII and several Catholic cardinals heard the lectures and were interested in the theory. On 1 November 1536, Nikolaus Cardinal von Schönberg, Archbishop of Capua, wrote to Copernicus from Rome:

Some years ago word reached me concerning your proficiency, of which everybody constantly spoke. At that time I began to have a very high regard for you... For I had learned that you had not merely mastered the discoveries of the ancient astronomers uncommonly well but had also formulated a new cosmology. In it you maintain that the earth moves; that the sun occupies the lowest, and thus the central, place in the universe... Therefore with the utmost earnestness I entreat you, most learned sir, unless I inconvenience you, to communicate this discovery of yours to scholars, and at the earliest possible moment to send me your writings on the sphere of the universe together with the tables and whatever else you have that is relevant to this subject ...

By then Copernicus' work was nearing its definitive form, and rumors about his theory had reached educated people all over Europe. Despite urgings from many quarters, Copernicus delayed publication of his book, perhaps from fear of criticism—a fear delicately expressed in the subsequent dedication of his masterpiece to Pope Paul III. Scholars disagree on whether Copernicus' concern was limited to possible astronomical and philosophical objections, or whether he was also concerned about religious objections.

The book

De revolutionibus, 1543. Click on image to read book.

Copernicus was still working on De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (even if not convinced that he wanted to publish it) when in 1539 Georg Joachim Rheticus, a Wittenberg mathematician, arrived in Frombork. Philipp Melanchthon, a close theological ally of Martin Luther, had arranged for Rheticus to visit several astronomers and study with them.

Rheticus became Copernicus' pupil, staying with him for two years and writing a book, Narratio prima (First Account), outlining the essence of Copernicus' theory. In 1542 Rheticus published a treatise on trigonometry by Copernicus (later included in the second book of De revolutionibus).

Under strong pressure from Rheticus, and having seen the favorable first general reception of his work, Copernicus finally agreed to give De revolutionibus to his close friend, Tiedemann Giese, bishop of Chełmno (Kulm), to be delivered to Rheticus for printing by Johannes Petreius at Nuremberg (Nürnberg). While Rheticus initially supervised the printing, he had to leave Nuremberg before it was completed, and he handed over the task of supervising the rest of the printing to a Lutheran theologian, Andreas Osiander.

Osiander added an unauthorised and unsigned preface, defending the work against those who might be offended by the novel hypotheses. He explained that astronomers may find different causes for observed motions, and choose whatever is easier to grasp. As long as a hypothesis allows reliable computation, it does not have to match what a philosopher might seek as the truth.

Death

Frombork Cathedral

Copernicus' Latin epitaph in Frombork Cathedral

Copernicus died in Frauenburg (Frombork) on 24 May 1543. Legend has it that the first printed copy of De revolutionibus was placed in his hands on the very day that he died, allowing him to take farewell of his life's work. He is reputed to have awoken from a stroke-induced coma, looked at his book, and then died peacefully.

Copernicus was reportedly buried in Frombork Cathedral, where archeologists for over two centuries searched in vain for his remains. Efforts to locate the remains in 1802, 1909, 1939 and 2004 had come to nought. In August 2005, however, a team led by Jerzy Gąssowski, head of an archaeology and anthropology institute in Pułtusk, after scanning beneath the cathedral floor, discovered what they believed to be Copernicus' remains.

The find came after a year of searching, and the discovery was announced only after further research, on November 3, 2008. Gąssowski said he was "almost 100 percent sure it is Copernicus." Forensic expert Capt. Dariusz Zajdel of the Polish Police Central Forensic Laboratory used the skull to reconstruct a face that closely resembled the features—including a broken nose and a scar above the left eye—on a Copernicus self-portrait. The expert also determined that the skull belonged to a man who had died around age 70—Copernicus' age at the time of his death.

The grave was in poor condition, and not all the remains of the skeleton were found; missing, among other things, was the lower jaw. The DNA from the bones found in the grave matched hair samples taken from a book owned by Copernicus which was kept at the library of the University of Uppsala in Sweden.

Copernican system

Main article: Copernican heliocentrism

Predecessors

Philolaus (c. 480–385 BCE), a Greek philosopher of the Pythagorean school, described an astronomical system in which the Earth, Moon, Sun, planets, and stars all revolved about a central fire. Heraclides Ponticus (387–312 BCE) proposed that the Earth rotates on its axis. According to Archimedes, Aristarchus of Samos (310–230 BCE) wrote of heliocentric hypotheses in a book that does not survive. Plutarch wrote that Aristarchus was accused of impiety for "putting the Earth in motion".

In a manuscript of De revolutionibus, Copernicus wrote, "It is likely that ... Philolaus perceived the mobility of the earth, which also some say was the opinion of Aristarchus of Samos", but later struck out the passage and omitted it from the published book.

Ptolemy

Main article: Almagest

The prevailing theory in Europe during Copernicus' lifetime was the one that the Greek astronomer Ptolemy published in his Almagest circa 150 CE. Ptolemy's system drew on previous Greek theories in which the Earth was the stationary center of the universe. Stars were embedded in a large outer sphere which rotated rapidly, approximately daily, while each of the planets, the Sun, and the Moon were embedded in their own, smaller spheres. Ptolemy's system employed devices, including epicycles, deferents and equants, to account for observations that the paths of these bodies differed from simple, circular orbits centered on the Earth.

Copernicus

Mid-16th-century portrait

Copernicus' major theory was published in De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres), in the year of his death, 1543, though he had formulated the theory several decades earlier.

Copernicus' "Commentariolus" summarized his heliocentric theory. It listed the "assumptions" upon which the theory was based as follows:

1. There is no one center of all the celestial circles or spheres.
2. The center of the earth is not the center of the universe, but only of gravity and of the lunar sphere.
3. All the spheres revolve about the sun as their mid-point, and therefore the sun is the center of the universe.
4. The ratio of the earth's distance from the sun to the height of the firmament (outermost celestial sphere containing the stars) is so much smaller than the ratio of the earth's radius to its distance from the sun that the distance from the earth to the sun is imperceptible in comparison with the height of the firmament.
5. Whatever motion appears in the firmament arises not from any motion of the firmament, but from the earth's motion. The earth together with its circumjacent elements performs a complete rotation on its fixed poles in a daily motion, while the firmament and highest heaven abide unchanged.
6. What appear to us as motions of the sun arise not from its motion but from the motion of the earth and our sphere, with which we revolve about the sun like any other planet. The earth has, then, more than one motion.

7. The apparent retrograde and direct motion of the planets arises not from their motion but from the earth's. The motion of the earth alone, therefore, suffices to explain so many apparent inequalities in the heavens.

De revolutionibus itself was divided into six parts, called "books":

1. General vision of the heliocentric theory, and a summarized exposition of his idea of the World
2. Mainly theoretical, presents the principles of spherical astronomy and a list of stars (as a basis for the arguments developed in the subsequent books)
3. Mainly dedicated to the apparent motions of the Sun and to related phenomena
4. Description of the Moon and its orbital motions
5. Concrete exposition of the new system
6. Concrete exposition of the new system

Successors

Georg Joachim Rheticus could have been Copernicus' successor, but did not rise to the occasion. Erasmus Reinhold could have been his successor, but died prematurely. The first of the great successors was Tycho Brahe, followed by his erstwhile co-worker, Johannes Kepler.

Copernicanism

Copernicus, astronomer

See also: Catholic Church and science

At original publication, Copernicus' epoch-making book caused only mild controversy, and provoked no fierce sermons about contradicting Holy Scripture. It was only three years later, in 1546, that a Dominican, Giovanni Maria Tolosani, denounced the theory in an appendix to a work defending the absolute truth of Scripture. He also noted that the Master of the Sacred Palace (i.e., the Catholic Church's chief censor), Bartolomeo Spina, a friend and fellow Dominican, had planned to condemn De revolutionibus but had been prevented from doing so by his illness and death.

Arthur Koestler, in his popular book The Sleepwalkers, asserted that Copernicus' book had not been widely read on its first publication. This claim was trenchantly criticised by Edward Rosen, and has been decisively disproved by Owen Gingerich, who examined every surviving copy of the first two editions and found copious marginal notes by their owners throughout many of them. Gingerich published his conclusions in 2004 in The Book Nobody Read.

It has been much debated why it was not until six decades after Spina and Tolosani's attacks on Copernicus's work that the Catholic Church took any official action against it. Proposed reasons have included the personality of Galileo Galilei and the availability of evidence such as telescope observations.

In March 1616, in connection with the Galileo affair, the Roman Catholic Church's Congregation of the Index issued a decree suspending De revolutionibus until it could be "corrected," on the grounds that the supposedly Pythagorean doctrine that the Earth moves and the Sun does not was "false and altogether opposed to Holy Scripture." The same decree also prohibited any work that defended the mobility of the Earth or the immobility of the Sun, or that attempted to reconcile these assertions with Scripture.

On the orders of Pope Paul V, Cardinal Robert Bellarmine gave Galileo prior notice that the decree was about to be issued, and warned him that he could not "hold or defend" the Copernican doctrine. The corrections to De revolutionibus, which omitted or altered nine sentences, were issued four years later, in 1620.

In 1633 Galileo Galilei was convicted of grave suspicion of heresy for "following the position of Copernicus, which is contrary to the true sense and authority of Holy Scripture," and was placed under house arrest for the rest of his life.

The Catholic Church's 1758 Index of Prohibited Books omitted the general prohibition of works defending heliocentrism, but retained the specific prohibitions of the original uncensored versions of De revolutionibus and Galileo's Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. Those prohibitions were finally dropped from the 1835 Index.

Nationality

"The nationality of Copernicus has been disputed among modern scholars almost as violently as the territory he lived in has been, down the ages."

Says historian John David North comparing the nationality discourse to the war that led to the cession of Royal Prussia to the Polish king roughly a decade before Copernicus' birth. North describes Copernicus as "a subject to the Polish king, drawing heavily on German culture," but also points out the strong influences of Italy and the Roman Catholic Church. Historian Michael Burleigh describes the nationality debate as a "customary tustle" and "totally insignificant battle" between German and Polish scholars during the interwar period. Astronomer Konrad Rudnicki describes the discourse as a "fierce scholarly quarrel in the times of nationalism", and says Copernicus was an inhabitant of a German-speaking territory belonging to Poland and of mixed German-Polish extraction. According to Czesław Miłosz, the discourse is an "absurd" projection of a modern understanding of nationality on Renaissance people, who identified with their home territories. Historian Norman Davies similarily says that Copernicus, as was common for his era, was "largely indifferent" to nationality and a local patriot considering himself "Prussian". Miłosz and Davies say that despite his German-speaking background, his working language was Latin. Davies further says that though his contacts were primarily with German-speaking Prussians, there is evidence that Copernicus also knew Polish. Davies concludes:

"Taking everything into consideration, there is good reason to regard him both as a German and as a Pole, yet in the sense that modern nationalists understand it, he was neither."

Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopedia Americana, The Columbia Encyclopedia, The Oxford World Encyclopedia, and the Microsoft Encarta Online Encyclopedia identify Copernicus as Polish, the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy states: "Thus the child of a German family was a subject of the Polish crown."

Copernicium

On July 14, 2009, the discoverers, from the Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Germany, of chemical element 112 (temporarily named ununbium) proposed to the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry that its permanent name be "copernicium" (symbol Cn). "After we had named elements after our city and our state, we wanted to make a statement with a name that was known to everyone," said Hofmann. "We didn't want to select someone who was a German. We were looking world-wide."

See also

• Copernican principle
• Monetae cudendae ratio
• Nicolaus Copernicus Monument in Toruń
• Nicolaus Copernicus Monument in Kraków
• Nicolaus Copernicus Monument in Warsaw

References

• Armitage, Angus (1951). The World of Copernicus. New York, NY: Mentor Books. ISBN 0-8464-0979-8.
• Barbara Bieńkowska (1973). The Scientific World of Copernicus: On the Occasion of the 500th Anniversary of His Birth, 1473–1973. Springer. ISBN 9027703531.
• Coyne, George V., S.J. (2005). The Church's Most Recent Attempt to Dispel the Galileo Myth. In McMullin (2005, pp.340–59).{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• Davies, Norman, God's Playground: A History of Poland, 2 vols., New York, Columbia University Press, 1982, ISBN 0-231-04327-9.
• DeMarco, Peter (2004-04-13). "Book quest took him around the globe". Boston Globe. Retrieved 2008-01-14.
• Dobrzycki, Jerzy, and Leszek Hajdukiewicz, "Kopernik, Mikołaj," Polski słownik biograficzny (Polish Biographical Dictionary), vol. XIV, Wrocław, Polish Academy of Sciences, 1969, pp. 3–16.
• Dreyer, John Louis Emil (1953) [1905]. A History of Astronomy from Thales to Kepler. New York, NY: Dover Publications.
• Fantoli, Annibale (2005). The Disputed Injunction and its Role in Galileo's Trial. In McMullin (2005, pp.117–49).
• Finocchiaro, Maurice A. (1989). The Galileo Affair: A Documentary History. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-06662-6.
• Gagné, Marc (2005). "Texts from The Galileo Affair: A Documentary History edited and translated by Maurice A. Finocchiaro". West Chester University course ESS 362/562 in History of Astronomy. Retrieved 2008-01-15. (Extracts from Finocchiaro (1989))
• Gingerich, Owen (2004). The Book Nobody Read. London: William Heinemann. ISBN 0-434-01315-3.
• Goodman, David C. (1991). The Rise of Scientific Europe, 1500-1800. Hodder Arnold H&S. ISBN 0-340-55861-X. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthor= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Heath, Sir Thomas (1913). Aristarchus of Samos, the ancient Copernicus ; a history of Greek astronomy to Aristarchus, together with Aristarchus's Treatise on the sizes and distances of the sun and moon : a new Greek text with translation and notes. London: Oxford University Press.
• Heilbron, John L. (2005). Censorship of Astronomy in Italy after Galileo. In McMullin (2005, pp.279–322).
• Koestler, Arthur (1963) [1959]. The Sleepwalkers: A History of Man's Changing Vision of the Universe. New York, NY: Grosset & Dunlap. ISBN 0448001594. Original edition published by Hutchinson (1959, London)
• Koeppen, Hans; et al. (1973). Nicolaus Copernicus zum 500. Geburtstag. Böhlau Verlag. ISBN 3-412-83573-2. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: checksum (help); Explicit use of et al. in: |author= (help)
• Koyré, Alexandre (1973). The Astronomical Revolution: Copernicus – Kepler – Borelli. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. ISBN 0-8014-0504-1.
• Kuhn, Thomas (1957). The Copernican Revolution: Planetary Astronomy in the Development of Western Thought. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. OCLC 535467.
• Lindberg, David C. and Numbers, Ronald L. "Beyond War and Peace: A Reappraisal of the Encounter between Christianity and Science". American Scientific Affiliation article. Retrieved 2007-04-22.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - Paper originally published in Church History (Vol. 55, No. 3, Sept. 1986).
• Linton, Christopher M. (2004). From Eudoxus to Einstein—A History of Mathematical Astronomy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-82750-8.
• Manetho; Ptolemy (1964) [1940]. Manetho Ptolemy Tetrabiblos. Loeb Classical Library edition, translated by W.G.Waddell and F.E.Robbins Ph.D. London: William Heinemann.
• McMullin, Ernan, ed. (2005). The Church and Galileo. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press. ISBN 0-268-03483-4. {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• Rabin, Sheila (2005). "Copernicus". The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2005 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.). Retrieved 2008-05-26.
• Ptolemy, Claudius (1964) [1940]. Tetrabiblos. Loeb Classical Library edition, translated by F.E.Robbins Ph.D. London: William Heinemann.
• Repcheck, Jack (2007). Copernicus' Secret: How the Scientific Revolution Began. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-8951-X.
• Rosen, Edward (1995). Copernicus and his Successors. London: Hambledon Press. ISBN 1 85285 071 X.
• Rosen, Edward (translator) (2004) [1939]. Three Copernican Treatises:The Commentariolus of Copernicus; The Letter against Werner; The Narratio Prima of Rheticus (Second Edition, revised ed.). New York, NY: Dover Publications. ISBN 0486436055. {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help)
• Russell, Jeffrey Burton (1997) [1991]. Inventing the Flat Earth—Columbus and Modern Historians. New York, NY: Praeger. ISBN 0-275-95904-X.
• de Santillana, Giorgio (1976—Midway reprint) [1955]. The Crime of Galileo. Chicago, Ill: Universtiy of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-73481-1. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |year= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)
• Sedlar, Jean W. (1994). East Central Europe in the Middle Ages 1000-1500. University of Washington Press. ISBN 0295972904.
• Thoren, Victor E. (1990). The Lord of Uraniborg. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-35158-8. (A biography of Danish astronomer and alchemist Tycho Brahe.)

Further reading

• Danielson, Dennis Richard (2006). The First Copernican: Georg Joachim Rheticus and the Rise of the Copernican Revolution. New York: Walker & Company. ISBN 0-8027-1530-3.
• Prowe, Leopold (1884). Nicolaus Coppernicus (in German). Berlin: Weidmannsche Verlagsbuchhandlung.
• Nicolaus Copernicus Gesamtausgabe (Nicolaus Copernicus Complete Edition; in German and Latin; 9 volumes, 1974–2004), various editors, Berlin, Akademie Verlag. A large collection of writings by and about Copernicus.
• Nicolaus Copernicus Gesamtausgabe: Biographies and Portraits of Copernicus from 16th to 18th century, Biographia Copernicana, 2004, ISBN 3-05-003848-9 [23] [24]
• Schmauch, Hans (1957), "Copernicus, Nicolaus", Neue Deutsche Biographie (in German), vol. 3, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 348–355
• Bruhns, Christian (1876), "Copernicus, Nicolaus", Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (in German), vol. 4, Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 461–469

External links

Primary Sources

• Works by Nicolaus Copernicus at Project Gutenberg
• De Revolutionibus, autograph manuscript — Full digital facsimile, Jagiellonian University
• Template:Pl icon Copernicus's letters to various celebrities, among others the King Sigmundus I of Poland

General

• O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Nicolaus Copernicus", MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, University of St Andrews
• Copernicus in Torun
• Nicolaus Copernicus Museum in Frombork
• Portraits of Copernicus: Copernicus's face reconstructed; Portrait; Nicolaus Copernicus
• Copernicus and Astrology — Cambridge University: Copernicus had – of course – teachers with astrological activities and his tables were later used by astrologers.
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry
• Find-A-Grave profile for Nicolaus Copernicus
• 'Body of Copernicus' identified — BBC article including image of Copernicus using facial reconstruction based on located skull
• Copernicus and Astrology
• Nicolaus Copernicus on the 1000 Polish Zloty banknote.
• Parallax and the Earth's orbit [25]
• Copernicus's model for Mars [26]
• Retrograde Motion[27]
• Copernicus's explanation for retrograde motion [28]
• Geometry of Maximum Elongation [29]
• Copernican Model [30]
• Portraits of Nicolaus Copernicus

About De Revolutionibus

• The Copernican Universe from the De Revolutionibus
• De Revolutionibus, 1543 first edition — Full digital facsimile, Lehigh University
• The front page of the De Revolutionibus
• The text of the De Revolutionibus
• A java applet about Retrograde Motion
• The Antikythera Calculator (Italian and English versions)
• Pastore Giovanni, ANTIKYTHERA E I REGOLI CALCOLATORI, Rome, 2006, privately published

Legacy

• Template:It icon Copernicus in Bologna — in Italian
• Chasing Copernicus: The Book Nobody Read — Was One of the Greatest Scientific Works Really Ignored? All Things Considered. NPR
• Copernicus and his Revolutions — A detailed critique of the rhetoric of De Revolutionibus
• Article which discusses Copernicus's debt to the Arabic tradition

German-Polish cooperation

• Template:De icon Template:Pl icon German-Polish school project on Copernicus
• Template:De icon Template:En icon Template:Pl icon Büro Kopernikus - An initiative of German Federal Cultural Foundation
• Template:De icon Template:Pl icon German-Polish "Copernicus Prize" awarded to German and Polish scientists (DFG website) (FNP website)