Johann Friedrich Weidler

Johann Friedrich Weidler (born April 23, 1691 in Großneuhausen ; † December 30, 1755 in Wittenberg ) was a German mathematician and legal scholar.

Life

At the age of fifteen, Weidler moved to the University of Jena , enrolled at the University of Wittenberg on June 10, 1712 , obtained a master's degree on April 30, 1712, and became an adjunct at the philosophical faculty of the Wittenberg Academy on April 19, 1715 . After he had been given the professorship of lower mathematics in 1715, he took over the chair of higher mathematics in 1719.

In 1726 and 1727 he interrupted his teaching activities to take a trip to Holland, England, France and Switzerland. In Basel he received his doctorate in law in Basel in 1727. He returned to Wittenberg and took on an extraordinary professorship at the law faculty. Nevertheless, his academic activity was focused on the mathematical discipline. Then, fearing that he would wear himself out in both disciplines, he devoted all his energy to the natural sciences.

Of the compendia he wrote as the basis for his lectures, the “Institutiones mathematicae”, which also included astronomy, received so much attention that they were published five times during Weidler's lifetime and had further editions after his death. With the “Institutiones subterraneae”, Weidler created the first scientific compendium of the art of mine cutting.

His greatest work, however, was the history of his favorite subject, astronomy, which contains a wealth of biographical and bibliographical data and is considered to be very reliable. In addition, he wrote a description of Mercury's passages through the sun in 1736 and 1747 and a calculation of the longitude and latitude of the city of Wittenberg, the work about which death surprised him. After he had led the Dean's office of the Wittenberg philosophical faculty several times, he took over the rector's office of the Wittenberg University in the summer semester of 1724 and 1744 . Since 1730 he was a foreign member of the Royal Prussian Society of Sciences .

Selection of works

• Diss. De skepti physica, Wittenberg 1712
• De Habacuci de Messia testimonio c. III, 13th from Abarbanelis glossemate liberato, Wittenberg 1712
• De Distantiis locum in Geographia accurate cognoscendis, Wittenberg 1713
• Schediasma in quo Apollonio Pergaeo doctrinae curvarum promotae gloriam vindicat, Wittenberg 1715
• Institutiones mathematicae, 1718
• Historia Astronomiae, Wittenberg 1741
• Institutiones subterraneae

literature

• Johann Georg Meusel : Lexicon of the German writers who died from 1750 to 1800. Vol. 14 p. 457 ( online )
• Christian Siegmund Georgi : Annales Academiae Vitebergensis 1655–1755. p 177, 377 (printed for 437)
• Nikolaus Müller : The finds in the tower knobs of the town church in Wittenberg. Evangelical bookstore Ernst Holtermann, Magdeburg 1912
• Walter Friedensburg : History of the University of Wittenberg. Publisher Max Niemeyer Halle (Saale) 1917
• Heinz Kathe : The Wittenberg Philosophical Faculty 1502–1817 (= Central German Research. Volume 117). Böhlau, Cologne / Weimar / Vienna 2002, ISBN 3-412-04402-4 .
• Siegmund Günther :  Weidler, Johann Friedrich . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 41, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1896, pp. 453-455.
• Weidler, Johann Friedrich. In: Johann Heinrich Zedler : Large complete universal lexicon of all sciences and arts . Volume 54, Leipzig 1747, columns 261-265.
• Johann Christian Poggendorff : Biographical-literary concise dictionary for the history of the exact sciences. Johann Ambrosius Barth, Leipzig 1863, 2nd volume, p. 1281 ( GoogleBooks )