Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff

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Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff (born December 5, 1774 in Stuttgart , † June 26, 1835 in Erlangen ) was a German mathematician , physicist and astronomer . Initially a professor in Estonia and founder of the Dorpat observatory , he later went to the universities of Würzburg and Erlangen. The member of three academies can be regarded as one of the last universal scholars, but his work on astrology was heavily criticized .

In the specialist literature he is sometimes cited as Johann Wilhelm Pfaff and Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff , incorrectly by astrologers also as Julius Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff .

Life

Wilhelm Pfaff was the youngest of twelve children of the Stuttgart Finance Councilor Friedrich Burkhard Pfaff and his wife Maria Magdalena, born. Fire. His older brother Johann Friedrich Pfaff also became a mathematics professor.

After high school, which he completed at the age of 16, he studied philosophy and theology at the Evangelical Monastery of Tübingen from 1791 to 1796 (Mag.phil. 1793, exam 1796) and was appointed abbey repeater (lecturer) in 1800. In order to pursue his diverse scientific interests, he then went on long trips. In August 1803 he received - presumably on the recommendation of his brother - a call to the newly established University of Dorpat (today Tartu) as a professor of applied mathematics and astronomy. The astronomical observation site was initially a private house, as the observatory was not built until 1809. Research topics included a. Astrometry , precession and orbital disturbances of planets. In 1804 he married the Baltic noblewoman Pauline von Patkul. Three out of four children died early.

Since Pfaff moved back to southern Germany, he moved to the Nuremberg Realstudienanstalt in 1809 to study the nature philosopher Gotthilf Heinrich Schubert (1780-1860). Under his influence he turned to diverse, including speculative studies, u. a. in linguistics , Sanskrit , Egyptology and opposed the hieroglyphic interpretation of Jean-François Champollion . In the spirit of romantic natural philosophy, he attempted a rehabilitation of astrology among specialist colleagues , but met with heavy criticism from Carl Friedrich Gauß and the astronomers Johann Elert Bode and Wilhelm Olbers .

At the beginning of 1817 Wilhelm Pfaff became professor extra facultatem for mathematics at the University of Würzburg , but in autumn 1818 he switched to a professorship for mathematics at the University of Erlangen , which he held until his death. As head of the physical cabinet, he also held courses in astronomy , dealt with the newly invented spectroscopy and promoted Josef Fraunhofer , whom he later proposed for an honorary doctorate. Pfaff himself became a member of the Academy in Petersburg , the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and the physical-medical society in Moscow.

After a year of widowhood, he married his second wife Luise Plank in Erlangen in 1817 . With her he also had three sons and a daughter, including Alexius Burkhard Emmanuel Friedrich Pfaff , who became a well-known mineralogist and geologist, and Hans Ulrich Vitalis Pfaff , professor of mathematics also in Erlangen. In 1827, while his wife was pregnant with his youngest child, Pfaff and Friedrich Rückert translated the Indian saga of Nala and Damayanti into German; the daughter Pauline therefore received the additional first name Damajanti after the birth. She later married the lawyer and politician Karl Brater .

Wilhelm Pfaff died in 1835 after several strokes.

Honors

  • 1803 Imperial Russian Councilor
  • 1807 corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy
  • 1808 corresponding member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences
  • 1810 Prize of the National Institute, Paris
  • around 1820 member of the physical and medical society in Moscow
  • 1950 Name of the Pfaffweg in Erlangen.

Pfaff and astrology

A private area of ​​interest Pfaff was the interpretation of the stars, so that he is sometimes incorrectly called the "last astrology professor at a German university". The Neue Deutsche Biographie mentions criticism from colleagues in this regard and sums it up: With his advocacy of astrology, P. was an exception among the astronomers of his time.

He wrote popular essays on astrology and translated parts of Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos , which were reprinted in 1938 by Hubert Korsch. The complete transmission by ME Winkel made Pfaff's summary unnecessary. While astrology slowly became more popular again in Great Britain around 1820, nothing similar took place in the German-speaking area.

Publications (selection)

  • Astronomical Observations and News, and Formulas for Saturn's Perturbation of Ceres . In: JE Bode: Berlin Astronomical Yearbook for the year 1809. Berlin 1806.
  • About the improvements in the midday telescope , observed star coverings, etc. In: Bode: Astronomisches Jahrbuch für das Jahr 1812. Berlin 1809, pp. 120-124.
  • Rows to calculate the elements of a planetary orbit . In: Bode: Astronomisches Jahrbuch for the year 1813. Berlin 1810, pp. 169–177.
  • About the variation of the planetary elements. In: Zach: Correspond. astron. Volume 25, 1812, pp. 393-408.
  • Ideas for the perturbation calculation according to Keppler Online at Google Books . In: Bode: Berliner Astronomisches Jahrbuch for 1817. Berlin 1814, pp. 160–166.
  • Textbook of physics, physical geography and astronomy. For use in high schools and middle schools. Carl Heyder Verlag, Erlangen 1823.
  • Hieroglyphics, its essence, and its sources. With hieroglyphic inscription of three scarabs. Nuremberg, Friedrich Campe 1824.
  • W. Herschel's discoveries in astronomy and related sciences. Cotta'sche Buchhandlung, Stuttgart / Tübingen 1828 ( online at Google Books ; PDF ).
  • Reflections on the spiral. In: Memorandum Münchn.Acad. Volume 1, 1932, pp. 1-14.
  • Astrology . Campe-Verlag, Nuremberg 1816.
  • The light and the regions of the world, together with a treatise on the conjunctions of planets and the star of the three wise men . Kunz'sche Buchhandlung, Bamberg 1821 ( online at Google Books ; PDF ).
  • Astrological paperback for 1822 and 1823 . Palm Verlag, Erlangen 1822/1823 (therein Claudius Ptolemy's astrological system ).
  • Man and the stars - fragments of the history of the world soul. Campe Verlag, Nuremberg 1834.
  • Complete directory of Pfaff's publications, PDF from Tartu University Library (including topics on mathematics, languages, hieroglyphs, the history of religion, the history of science)

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Foreign members of the Russian Academy of Sciences since 1724: Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff. Russian Academy of Sciences. Retrieved March 22, 2017 (Russian).

Web links