Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543)

Nicolaus Copernicus (Nikolaus Koppernigk or Mikołaj Kopernik) was a Polish astronomer and mathematician whose theory that the Earth moved around the Sun altered profoundly the perception of the universe and provided a new cosmological framework for the work of later astronomy, despite being rejected during his lifetime by the Roman Catholic church. Copernicus was the son of Nicolaus, a merchant, and Barbara, daughter of Lucas Watzenrode the elder, a wealthy merchant and counsellor in Toruń. The astronomer was born in this city in 1473 and following the death of his father when he was about ten years old, he was raised by his uncle Lucas Watzenrode the younger (1447–1512) and, together with his brother Andreas, he matriculated at the University of Kraków (the Jagiellonian University) in 1491–92.

In 1489, his uncle was elevated to the position of Prince-Bishop of Warmia and Copernicus seems to have left Kraków, possibly to assume the canonry in Warmia that had fallen vacant in August 1495 upon on the death of Jan Czanow. His installation to this position was postponed, however, and Copernicus and his brother were sent by their uncle to Italy to study canon law.

Copernicus studied between 1496 and 1500 at the University of Bologna where, although he was officially studying canon law, he was taught by and lodged with the astronomer Domenico Maria de Novarra (1454–1504). On 20 October 1497, while in Bologna, he received notification of his appointment as a canon at Frombork (Frauenburg) Cathedral. In 1500, he and his brother moved for a year to Rome, before returning briefly to Warmia, specifically to Frombork, the following year. By the end of 1501, however, he was back in Italy, enrolled on this occasion at the University of Padua, where he studied medicine for two years.

From 1503, Copernicus served in Warmia as his uncle’s secretary and physician, probably until the bishop’s death in 1512. Thereafter, Copernicus resumed his duties as canon in the Ermland Chapter at Frombork, where he began to focus in earnest on his astronomical studies, and where he had created an observatory in his rooms at one of the town’s fortification towers.

Just two years later, Comenius circulated a hand-written book which is called now the Little Commentary. In this he set out his theory that the sun is situated at the centre of the earth’s universe, that the earth revolves around it, and that the motion of the planets is the result of the motion of the Earth. Building on this initial work, he began to prepare De revolutionibus orbium coelestium, which he continued to prepare alongside his administrative duties and as well as, from 1519, throughout the war between Poland and the Teutonic Knights.

Were it not for the visit of Georg Joachim Rheticus from the the University of Wittenberg, however, Copernicus’s masterpiece might not have reached publication. Rheticus spent at least two years with Copernicus at Frombork and it was the publication in Danzig of the younger Protestant astronomer’s First report to Johann Schöner on the Books of the Revolutions of the learned gentleman and distinguished mathematician, the Reverend Doctor Nicolaus Copernicus of Toruń, Canon of Warmia, by a certain youth devoted to mathematics that encouraged Copernicus to complete De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. Rheticus delivered the manuscript of Copernicus’s work to the printer Johann Petreius in Nürnberg, where Andreas Osiander, a Lutheran theologian supervised the printing. In place of Copernicus’s Preface, Osiander inserted an unsigned letter to the reader, explaining that the theory expounded in the book was not intended as the truth. The publication remained anonymous until, fifty years later, Kepler revealed Copernicus to be the author. It is possible that this obfuscation was an attempt to ensure the work was read and not destroyed upon publication.

Copernicus did not take holy orders, despite threats to remove his income if he were not ordained. He is thought to have received on his deathbed a copy of De revolutionibus. He died in Frombork on 24 May 1543 of a brain haemorrhage.