He stopped the Sun and moved the Earth

He stopped the Sun and moved the Earth Chapter 2

Now, I’ll tell you the story about it how Nicholaus Copernicus came to the conclusion that „the Earth goes around the Sun”.

You have surely been astonished with the fact that after his return from his studies in Italy Copernicus never lived in Toruń. I am surprised too because Toruń is a beautiful town, but I’ll tell you about it later. This situation is the reason for it that scholars have discussed the problem of the citizenship of Nichoalus Copernicus up till now. However, what made Nicolaus Copernicus state that „the Earth goes round the Sun”? The observations of the heavenly space surrounding the Earth were carried out even by the ancient people. However, till the very fifteenth century the Earth was thought to be the centre of the Universe and no other possibility was taken into consideration.

Soon after his return to Poland Nicolaus Copernicus was appointed to be a personal doctor of the bishop of Warmia which took place in 1507. This year, he also wrote worked out „A little commentary ”that is so-called „Commentaridus” about theories of the movements of celestial bodies. It was the first outline of the heliocentric theory and it was spread in numerous copies. One of pages of „De rewolutionibus”

In 1510 Nicoalus Copernicus moved to Frombork and made the map of Warmia. Together with the Chapter of Warmia he pledged allegiance to the Polish king – Zygmunt the First in 1512. Answering the appeal of the Latheran Council in 1513, he worked out and sent to Rome his own project of the reform of the calendar. At the back of his house, he made his private observatory with an observational plate and his own astronomical instruments.

You are surely interested in it what instruments were used by Copernicus. Here are some of them. You can watch them at the Museum of Copernicus in Toruń. The interior of Copernicus family house

This is a quadrant. It is an old instrument for calculating the position of stars. It was in the shape of a quarter of a cricle with an angular scale on it and a movable sight vane along it

Another device used by Copernicus is a triquetrum. This instrument was even known in the second century B. C. It was applied to calculating distances between stars.

This apparatus is called an astrolabe. Copernicus used it to calculate the position of celestial bodies. It was apllied until the eighteenth century.

You know what? I have just made a great discovery! Copernicus used an astrolabe. The device the invention of which is ascribed to Hypatia, a Greek philosopher and mathematician living in the fourth century A. D. Sailors used it to calculate the latitude, to measure time and to set hours. If you know something more about this philosopher, you can tell me about her on some other occasion.

Now, I am going to tell you how „De Revolutionibus”the greatestof Nicholaus Copernicus’work was written. In the sixteenth century, it was widely believed that the Earth was the centre of Universe, so writing such a work reguired a profound knowledge and great courage.

„On the revolutions of the heavenly spheres”

Although today we know that Nicholaus Copernicus did not go wrong in his work, but in the sixteenth century views caused a real revolution which was also called „the Copernican revolution”. I will tell you the history of this work now.

In this way one of the greatest Polish painters Jan Matejko, imagined the work of the Nicolaus Copernicus

In 1514 Nicholaus Copernicus started to write the first book of his work „De revolutionibus”. It was the work of his life. Included the lecture on the heliocentric theory of the world structure. At that time, it was a real revolution both in science and in the outlook of that time. However, don’t think that the work of Nicholaus Copernicus was understood and accepted in the scientific, clerical and philosophical circles at once. This is the spine of the work „De revolutionibus”

Copernicus didn’t decide to publish the outcomes of his scientific studies at once but onlyin 1535; by the initiative of B. Wapowsky he worked out a summary based on the astronomical tables from „De Revolutionibus” The information about this theory spread throughout Europe. It also reached Georg Joachim von Lauchen, called Rheticus, a German astronomer at the Wittenberg University. In 1539 he came to Frombork to acquaint himself with the work of Copernicus. Rheticus became the enthusiast of the Copernicus theory. He made him publish the work. The extract from it, known under the shortened tittle „Narratio prima”, made by Rheticus, was printed in Gdansk in 1540. In 1541, Rheticus gave the work to the printer in Nuremberg. The print of the work was under the custody of A. Osiander who took out of the work without Copernicus knowledge, his own intruductions and he put there his own one not signed, showing the Copernicus theory as a hypothesis making the calculations much easier. It was not according to the Copernicus view, clearly form ulated in the letter dedicated to Pope Paul the Third, printed at the beginning of the same book.

In 1533 the Copernicus outlook included in the manuscript of his work „De Revolutionibus” was presented to Pope Clement the Seventh. A teologist from Nuremberg, Andrzej Osiander told Nicholaus Copernicus into presenting in the preface of this work theory as a hypothesis which was to make this work much less revolutionary in this way. In 1542 the first two sheets of „De Revolutionibus” were printed. Nicolasu Copernicus sent to Norynberg the preface written by himself and dedicated to Pope Paul The Third Nicholaus Copernicus never saw the publication of his work because he died on the twenty fourth of May 1543. .