Anton Maria Schyrleus de Rheita

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Anton Maria Schyrleus de Rheita (originally Johann Burkhard Schyrl , Schyrle , Schürle ; * 1604 in Reutte , † October / November 1660 in Ravenna ) was a priest and astronomer . He was a master at designing telescopes .

Life

Born in 1604 in Reutte, his older half-brother Georg Schyrle had been court counselor and kitchen master of the Freising Prince-Bishop Veit Adam von Gepeckh since 1622 and his brother Elias became a father in the Order of Birgit in Altomünster near Augsburg in 1643.

Entry into the order and first optical studies

At the age of 18 he entered the Indersdorf monastery of the Augustinian canons as a monk and came to Ingolstadt on October 14, 1623 to study for three years , where he also became familiar with astronomy. At the University of Ingolstadt earlier had Christoph Scheiner , Johann Baptist Cysat and now the Jesuit Hieronymus Kinig (1582-1646), who remained in Ingolstadt to 1626, optics and astronomy taught. Here he acquired the theoretical and practical knowledge of grinding lenses and arranging them by alternating concave and convex lenses so that the desired magnifications were achieved.

After completing his studies, however, he did not return to the Augustinians, but instead joined the Capuchin Order in Passau in 1627 . His family name went under according to the monastic tradition; his monastery name Anton Maria received the addition "de Rheita" (from Reutte ). In 1636 his order sent him to Linz as a lecturer in philosophy .

Diplomat and courier

At the castle there, Emperor Ferdinand III. Elector Philipp Christoph von Sötern captured for political reasons . Schyrle served this from 1637 initially as confessor and advisor, but from 1638 as diplomat and courier, for which he had received the travel permit from the Pope. In 1640 he traveled to Rome to visit Pope Urban VIII as the elector's representative for the Visitatione Sacrorum Liminum, to tell him about the state of the dioceses of Trier and Speyer . The emperor, who had become suspicious of these confidential contacts, banished Schyrle from all Habsburg lands in 1641.

(According to another tradition about his early years he came from Bohemia . Antonín Maria Šírek z Reity (* 1597 Bohemia; † 1660 Ravenna) was a priest and member of the Capuchin Brotherhood in the Rheit monastery in Bohemia. Such a monastery cannot be found.)

Further astronomical research

As a result, he was separated from the elector for four years, during which he busily researched. In 1642 Schyrle made astronomical observations and optical measurements in Cologne . In 1643 his first scientific work was published in Löwen . Schyrle meant "to prove" that the planet Jupiter has not four but nine moons and that Saturn has six. He also believed to have "discovered" Martian moons. However, Schyrle incorrectly interpreted stars in the background of the planets as their supposed satellites. Therefore, and because he, together with Malapart and Tarde, claimed that Scheiner's sunspots were planets, Johann Heinrich von Mädler called him "not at all happy in his astronomical conjectures".

In 1643 he was in Augsburg with Johann Wiesel . Here he also met Gervasius Mattmüller (* around 1593; † May 2, 1668), who had lived in Vienna as an imperial engineer and optician since 1637. In August 1644 he was in Antwerp to prepare his book. In 1645, after Kepler had pointed out that the inverted image in his telescope could be set up again by adding a third lens, Schyrle first constructed such a terrestrial telescope. In Antwerp in the same year he published his major scientific work Oculus Enoch et Eliae , with which he presented his binocular telescope. (The mention of the prophets Enoch and Elias, who saw a new world in the coming of Christ, should indicate that new worlds can also be discovered with the new telescope.)

When the elector returned from captivity in 1645, Schyrle moved to him in Trier and was drawn into the bitter power struggles for his successor as his political advisor. His work for the elector also gave him the financial backing to continue his expensive research. When the elector died in 1652, Schyrle left Trier to avoid arrest.

However, his enemies did not rest and unleashed an inquisition process against him, which occupied him until the end of his life. In 1653 he was arrested in Brussels on instructions from Rome, but was able to evade imprisonment and soon returned to Germany after fleeing via France. He began with the construction of an approximately three meter long telescope for the Mainz Elector Johann Philipp von Schönborn .

Activity and custody in Italy and start of the manufacture of telescopes

In 1656 the order general ordered Schyrle to Rome, assigned him Bologna as his residence, where he was imprisoned in a monastery after a short freedom. In 1657 Pope Alexander VII ordered his exile to Ravenna . In exile, Schyrle again developed great creative power when he made a powerful telescope for the Elector of Mainz. In 1657 he planned to set up the world's first modern observatory in Mainz. But since he never regained freedom and died in the place of exile, this project remained unrealized.

Pioneer of telescope construction

As a pioneer of telescope construction, he towered over Galileo and Johannes Keppler. His telescope, made up of four convex lenses, made it possible to make observations that were not previously possible. He brought the exact planning that made series production possible into the shell construction. His theoretical explanations about the astronomical telescope were even more significant. He created the terms lens and eyepiece , which are still used today . With his binocular telescope he achieved larger and sharper images than with the conventional one-tube telescope. He also constantly trained opticians. One of his students offered the telescope developed by Schyrle to the English for sale. The British made this telescope themselves from 1660 and used it for military purposes.

The lunar crater Rheita and the Vallis Rheita are named after him.

Works

literature

Individual evidence

  1. Inge Keil: Augustanus Opticus p. 66 limited preview in the Google book search
  2. Hans Karl König: SCHÜRELE in Tirol April 2013 (PDF file)
  3. ^ A Pallas nagy lexikona. In: mek.niif.hu. Retrieved January 8, 2015 (Hungarian).
  4. ^ Johann Heinrich von Mädler: History of the sky science. Volume 1, 1872/73, p. 268.
  5. ^ Reports and communications from the Altertums-Verein zu Wien, Volume 50, 1918, p. 33
  6. Ludwig Darmstaedter: Handbook on the History of Natural Sciences and Technology 1866 (PDF; 3.0 MB)
  7. Abraham-Gotthelf Kästner: History of mathematics since the restoration of the sciences to the end of the eighteenth century. 1800, p. 81. Limited preview in Google Book search