Godefroy Wendelin
Godefroy Wendelin , Latinized Vendelinus, (born June 6, 1580 in Herk-de-Stad as Govaert Wendelen, † October 24, 1667 in Gent ) was a Belgian astronomer.
life and work
He went to school in his hometown, from 1595 to the Jesuit college in Tournai and then to the college in Leuven , where Justus Lipsius (1547-1606) and Puteanus (1574-1646), his later close friend, were his teachers. He then went on a journey and was in Provence from 1604 to 1611 , where he worked as a tutor for the son of André d'Arnaud , Seigneur de Miravail and lieutenant general at the court of the Seneschal of Forcalquier . He carried out astronomical observations in Châteauneuf-Miravail , from the Chateau des Graves and on the Montagne de Lure and the rise of Contrat. For example, he observed a lunar eclipse in 1605 .
He was ordained a priest in Brussels in 1619 and served as a priest in Geetbets from 1620 to 1632 and in Herk from 1633 to 1648. From 1648 until his retirement in 1658 he was at Tournai Cathedral.
He defended (despite condemnation by the church) the heliocentric worldview in his Tetralogia Cometica from 1653 (as in his book Eclipses lunares from 1644). With Johan Philip Lansberg , he was one of the earliest representatives of the Copernican doctrine in the southern Netherlands.
Around 1630 he determined the relative distance between the moon and earth using the method of Aristarchus of Samos , whereby he came to a ratio of 243. In truth this is 384, and Aristarchus found around 20 in ancient times.
From observations of Jupiter's moons in 1648 he confirmed Kepler's third law for their orbit . This was made famous by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Battista Riccioli in 1651. After Pierre Costabel, Wendelin used observation data from Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc from 1610. Johannes Kepler independently found in 1622 that his third law is applicable to the moons of Jupiter. However, the verifiability was limited due to uncertainties regarding the major semi-axes of the orbits. Wendelin determined the latitude of Marseilles and undertook longitude determinations following Peiresc.
He corresponded with Michel Coignet , Marin Mersenne , Pierre Gassendi and Constantijn Huygens .
The moon crater Vendelinus is named after him.
Works
- Loxias seu de obliquitate solis , Antwerp 1626
- Aries seu Aurei Velleris encomium , 1632
- De tetracty Pythagorae dissertatio epistolica, ad Erycium Puteanum , 1637
- Arcanorum caelestium Lampas τετράλυχνος , Brussels 1643
- Eclipses lunares from 1573 to 1643 observatae , Antwerp 1644
- Leges salicae illustratae , Antwerp 1649
- Teratologia cometica 1652
- De causis naturalibus, pluviae purpureae Bruxellensis , London 1655
- Arcanorum caelestium Sphinx et Oedipus seu Lampas δωδεκράλυχνος , Tournai 1658
literature
- Pierre Costabel Peiresc et Wendelin: les satellites de Jupiter de Galilée à Newton in Anne Reinbold (ed.) Peiresc, ou, La passion de connaître , Paris: J. Vrin 1990
- Henri Bosmans Sur les papiers de l'astronome Wendelin aux archives générales du royaume à Bruxelles , Annales de la Societé Scientifique de Bruxelles, Volume 33, 1909, 74-92. pdf
- HJ Zwarterbroeckx, article Wendelin in Nationaal Biografisch Woordenboek
- F. Silverijser Een groot Limburger. Goovart Wendelin , Maaseik 1922
- the same godefroid Wendelin. Sa vie, son ambiance et ses travaux , Bulletin Inst. Archéologique Liégeois, 58, 1934
- Lucien Godeaux, article in Biographie Nationale, Brussels 1938
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ The first name is also written Godefroid or Gottfried and the last name also Vendelin
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Wendelin, Godefroy |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Wendelen, Govaert (maiden name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Belgian astronomer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 6, 1580 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Herk-de-Stad |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 24, 1667 |
| Place of death | Ghent |