Nicolaus Copernicus

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Please read the talk page before editing the two introductory paragraphs. They represent a consensus as to how best to present the essential information about Copernicus in the article's introduction. Other issues are discussed later in the article. Whether nationality should be attributed to Copernicus is a contentious issue: see the talk page and its archives.

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Nicolaus Copernicus (19 February 1473 – 24 May 1543) was a Renaissance polymath who formulated a model of the universe that placed the Sun rather than Earth at its center. The publication of Copernicus's model in his book ' (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres), just before his death in 1543, was a major event in the history of science, triggering the Copernican Revolution and making a pioneering contribution to the Scientific Revolution. Though a similar heliocentric model had been developed eighteen centuries earlier by Aristarchus of Samos, an ancient Greek astronomer, Copernicus likely arrived at his model independently.

Copernicus was born and died in Royal Prussia, a semiautonomous and multilingual region created within the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland from lands regained from the Teutonic Order after the Thirteen Years' War.

A polyglot and polymath, he obtained a doctorate in canon law and was a mathematician, astronomer, physician, classics scholar, translator, governor, diplomat, and economist. From 1497 he was a Warmian Cathedral chapter canon. In 1517 he derived a quantity theory of money—a key concept in economics—and in 1519 he formulated an economic principle that later came to be called Gresham's law.

Life

thumb|upright=1.2|Copernicus's [[Toruń birthplace (ul. Kopernika 15, left). Together with no. 17 (right), it forms Muzeum Mikołaja Kopernika.]]

Nicolaus Copernicus was born on 19 February 1473 in the city of Toruń (Thorn), in the province of Royal Prussia, in the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland,

Father's family

Copernicus's father's family originally migrated to Silesia in the thirteenth century. The family can be traced to a village between Nysa (Neiße) and Prudnik (Neustadt). The village's name has been variously spelled Kopernik, Copernik, Copernic, Kopernic, Coprirnik, and modern Koperniki. likely the son of Jan (or Johann), was first recorded in Kraków in 1448. and its Grand Master once referred to him as "the devil incarnate". In 1489 Watzenrode was elected Bishop of Warmia (Ermeland, Ermland) against the preference of King Casimir IV, who had hoped to install his own son in that seat. Watzenrode came to be considered the most powerful man in Warmia, and his wealth, connections and influence allowed him to secure Copernicus's education and career as a canon at Frombork Cathedral.

Contradictions in the systems of Aristotle and Ptolemy

Copernicus's four years at Kraków played an important role in the development of his critical faculties and initiated his analysis of logical contradictions in the two "official" systems of astronomy—Aristotle's theory of homocentric spheres, and Ptolemy's mechanism of eccentrics and epicycles—the surmounting and discarding of which would be the first step toward the creation of Copernicus's own doctrine of the structure of the universe. Edward Rosen asserts that he was not. Copernicus did take minor orders, which sufficed for assuming a chapter canonry.

Italy

University of Bologna, 1496–1501

Meanwhile, leaving Warmia in mid-1496—possibly with the retinue of the chapter's chancellor, Jerzy Pranghe, who was going to Italy—in the fall, possibly in October, Copernicus arrived in Bologna and a few months later (after 6 January 1497) signed himself into the register of the Bologna University of Jurists' "German nation", which included young Poles from Silesia, Prussia and Pomerania as well as students of other nationalities. and by Canon Bernhard Sculteti. This time he studied at the University of Padua, famous as a seat of medical learning, and—except for a brief visit to Ferrara in May–June 1503 to pass examinations for, and receive, his doctorate in canon law—he remained at Padua from fall 1501 to summer 1503.

Other observations

With Novara, Copernicus observed an occultation of Aldebaran by the Moon on 9 March 1497. Copernicus also observed a conjunction of Saturn and the Moon on 4 March 1500. He saw an eclipse of the Moon on 6 November 1500.

Work

thumb|upright=1.1|Copernicus's translation of [[Theophylact Simocatta's Epistles. Cover shows coat of arms of (clockwise from top) Poland, Lithuania, and Kraków]]

thumb|upright=1.1|Copernicus's tower at [[Frombork, where he lived and worked; reconstructed since World War II]]

thumb|upright=1.1|[[Olsztyn|Olsztyn Castle, where Copernicus resided from 1516 to 1521]]

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, apart from brief journeys to Kraków and to nearby Prussian cities: Toruń (Thorn), Gdańsk (Danzig), Elbląg (Elbing), Grudziądz (Graudenz), Malbork (Marienburg), Königsberg (Królewiec). 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. He was the child of German-speaking parents and grew up with German as his mother tongue. His first alma mater was the University of Kraków in Poland. When he later studied in Italy, at the University of Bologna, he joined the German Nation, a student organization for German-speakers of all allegiances (Germany would not become a nation-state until 1871). His family stood against the Teutonic Order and actively supported the city of Toruń during the Thirteen Years' War. Copernicus's father lent money to Poland's King Casimir IV Jagiellon to finance the war against the Teutonic Knights, but the inhabitants of Royal Prussia also resisted the Polish crown's efforts for greater control over the region. The Oxford World Encyclopedia, Kasparek and Kasparek stated that it is incorrect to ascribe him German or Polish nationality, as "a 16th century figure cannot be described with the use of 19th and 20th century concepts".

Historian Michael Burleigh describes the nationality debate as a "totally insignificant battle" between German and Polish scholars during the interwar period. The process involved public nomination and voting for the new names. In December 2015, the IAU announced the winning name for 55 Cancri A was Copernicus.

Copernicus Gesellschaft

A German non-profit society founded in February 1988 at the Max Planck Institute for Aeronomy to promote international collaboration in the geo- and space sciences. The society supports open-access scientific publishing, organizes scientific conferences (including those of the European Geophysicists' Union and European Meteorological Society), and presents the Copernicus Medal for "ingenious, innovative work in the geosciences and planetary and space sciences, and in their exceptional promotion and international cooperation".

Poland

Copernicus is commemorated by the Nicolaus Copernicus Monument in Warsaw, designed by Bertel Thorvaldsen (1822), completed in 1830; and by Jan Matejko's 1873 painting, Astronomer Copernicus, or Conversations with God.

Named for Copernicus are Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń; Warsaw's Copernicus Science Centre, the Centrum Astronomiczne im. Mikołaja Kopernika (a principal Polish research institution in astrophysics), Copernicus Hospital in Poland's fourth largest city, Łódź, and the Wrocław Airport, Port lotniczy Wrocław im. Mikołaja Kopernika or in English: Nicolaus Copernicus Wrocław Airport.

In arts and literature

Contemporary literary and artistic works inspired by Copernicus include:

Symphony No. 2 (Górecki), a choral symphony, by composer Henryk Górecki, commissioned by the Kosciuszko Foundation. The piece was composed in honor of the 500th anniversary of the birthday of Nicolaus Copernicus.
Mover of the Earth, Stopper of the Sun, overture for symphony orchestra, by composer Svitlana Azarova, commissioned by ONDIF.
Doctor Copernicus, 1975 novel by John Banville, sketching the life of Copernicus and the 16th-century world in which he lived.
Orb: On the Movements of the Earth, a Japanese manga series from 2020, later adapted into anime.

Notes

References

Sources

Originally titled Sun, Stand Thou Still.
Davies, Norman, God's Playground: A History of Poland, 2 vols., New York, Columbia University Press, 1982, .
Dobrzycki, Jerzy, and Leszek Hajdukiewicz, "Kopernik, Mikołaj", Polski słownik biograficzny (Polish Biographical Dictionary), vol. XIV, Wrocław, Polish Academy of Sciences, 1969, pp. 3–16.
(Extracts from Finocchiaro (1989))
Original edition published by Hutchinson (1959, London)
Miłosz, Czesław, The History of Polish Literature, second edition, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1969, .
Mizwa, Stephen, Nicolaus Copernicus, 1543–1943, Kessinger Publishing, 1943.
. Features a fictional play about Rheticus' visit to Copernicus, sandwiched between chapters about the visit's pre-history and post-history.
(A biography of Danish astronomer and alchemist Tycho Brahe.)

External links

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Primary sources

De Revolutionibus, autograph manuscript – Full digital facsimile, Jagiellonian University
Works by Nicolaus Copernicus in digital library Polona

General

Copernicus in Torun
Nicolaus Copernicus Thorunensis
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry
'Body of Copernicus' identified – BBC article including image of Copernicus using facial reconstruction based on located skull
Copernican Model