John Hevelius

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Johannes Hevelius, painted by Daniel Schultz (1615–1683)
Map of the moon by Johannes Hevelius to Selenographia
Monument to Hevelius in front of the Old Town Hall in Gdansk

Johannes Hevelius (according to his writings in Latin , German Johannes Hevel or Johann Hewelcke , Polish Jan Heweliusz ; born January 28, 1611 in Danzig ; † January 28, 1687 ibid) was a Danzig astronomer and is considered the founder of the cartography of the moon , of selenography .

Life

youth and education

Observatory on the roofs in Gdansk

Johannes Hevelius came from a rich family of brewers in the old town of Gdańsk . His father was the Danzig elder man and brewery owner Abraham Hewelcke (1576-1649), a son of the elder man and brewer Michel († 1603) and Katharina Hecker. The mother Cordula (* 1592) was a daughter of Hans Hecker and Sara Kringel.

Johannes Hevelius attended the Academic Gymnasium in Danzig from 1618. In 1622 he was enrolled at the University of Königsberg . He stayed in Gondeltsch ( Gądecz or Grudziądz/Graudenz ?) for three years to learn the Polish language.

From 1627 he was back in Danzig, where he received private lessons from the high school professor Peter Crüger , who was a student of Johannes Kepler and Tycho Brahe . From 1630 Johannes Hevelius studied law in Leiden in the Netherlands. He then traveled to England and France , where he met, among others, Pierre Gassendi (1592-1655), Marin Mersenne (1588-1648) and Athanasius Kircher (1602-1680).

Brewer and councilman in Danzig

In 1634, at the urgent request of his father, Hevelius settled in his native town as a brewer of the well-known Jopenbier , which was then and still is considered exceptional . On March 21, 1635, he married Katharine Rebeschke, who was two years his junior and owned two houses next to each other in Pfefferstadt 47 and 48. The following year he joined the brewers' guild and became its guild master in 1643 .

In 1651 he became a councilman , and in 1660, 1669 and 1679 to 1686 he was chairman of the city council of the Altstadt .

Astronomical research in Gdańsk

From 1639, however, his main interest was astronomy . When his father died in 1649, he built a large observatory on the roofs of the three houses . Gradually he equipped it with numerous instruments: in addition to the lens telescopes , with which he examined the surface of the earth's moon, also with precise angle measuring instruments, such as astronomical quadrants and sextants . Hevelius was heavily involved in the construction of his instruments. Together with a watchmaker from Gdańsk, he built large angle measuring instruments from metal, but for which he did not use the telescopic sights that were just emerging. Initially, he also ground the lenses for his telescopes himself. A large 45 m telescope designed by him, which was set up outside the city, caused a stir, but was never functional. A first simple version of the periscope goes back to him .

Hevelius observed sunspots , made maps of the moon , and discovered the moon's libration . He published his studies of the moon in 1647 in his first major work Selenographia sive Lunae Descriptio , which established his international fame. He discovered four comets in 1652, 1661, 1672 and 1677 . Based on his observations, he proposed the thesis that comets orbit the sun in parabolic orbits.

In 1661 a halo phenomenon was observed in Danzig, and Hevelius described it to the pastor Georg Fehlau at St. Mary's Church in Danzig, who noted: "Sevenfold miracles of the sun or seven parhelia, so in this 1661 year February 20th new style on Sunday Sexagesima at 11 o'clock until after 12 in the sky we were seen.” In 1662 Hevelius printed the book Mercurius in sole visus at Simon Reiniger in Danzig, in which he describes the Danzig halo phenomenon.

In 1662 Hevelius' first wife, Katharine, died. A year later he married the young merchant's daughter Elisabeth Koopman (1647-1693). Four children came from this marriage. Elisabeth researched together with Hevelius and published two more of his works after his death. She is considered the first woman whose achievements in astronomy were recognized.

Certificate of Appointment as a Fellow of the Royal Society

On March 30, 1664, Hevelius was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society .

Because of the lack of telescopic sights, he was sharply attacked by the Englishman Robert Hooke , who at the same time questioned Hevelius' entire measurement results. When Edmond Halley finally traveled to Danzig in 1679, after several weeks of comparative measurements with the instruments he had brought with him, he had to admit that Hevelius achieved just as good results with the naked eye as he did with the telescopes.

last years

In the night of September 26th to 27th, 1679, Hevelius' observatory burned down, and his books and instruments were also destroyed by the flames. Although Hevelius immediately set to work on the reconstruction, he did not live to see the completion.

He died on January 28, 1687, his 76th birthday, in his native town of Danzig and was buried in St. Catherine's Church. The grave, in which his family members are also buried, was only rediscovered in 1986 under a marble slab weighing several tons.

Johannes Hevelius introduced several constellations , which are presented in his work Firmamentum Sobiescianum, sive uranographia , published posthumously in 1690 . The following constellations have survived : Canes Venatici, Leo Minor, Scutum , Vulpecula , Lacerta , Lacerta, Lynx and Sextant . Other constellations he suggested were Cerberus, Mount Maenalus (Mons Maenalus), Fly (Musca, see Northern Fly ) and the Lesser Triangle (Triangulum minor).

appreciation and honors

17th/18th century

Hevelius is considered one of the most important astronomers of his time and was supported by many sides:

  • by King Louis XIV of France, who granted him an honorary pay in 1663,
  • by the Polish king John III. Sobieski , who determined an honorary pay in 1667, and to whom Hevelius dedicated the constellation Shield (Scutum).
  • In 1664 Johannes Hevelius was made a Fellow of the Royal Society in London.
  • There is still an epitaph for him in St. Catherine 's Church in Danzig from 1780, which was designed by Hevelius' great-grandson Daniel Gottlieb Davisson.
  • The contemporary astronomer Johann Jacob Zimmermann designed a kind of celestial globe based on Hevelius' register of fixed stars. Seven of the constellations he introduced are in use today.

19/20 century

  • In 1887 a commemorative plaque, which still exists today, was placed in the hall of the old town hall.
  • In 1894 his hometown Gdańsk named Hevelius Square after him.
  • In 1935 the lunar crater Hevelius was named after him.
  • In 1973 a monument was erected in the Old Town of Gdańsk .
  • In 1987, on the 300th anniversary of his death, a Polish-language memorial plaque was placed on the site of his home (demolished after World War II).
  • In 1994 the asteroid (5703) Hevelius was named after him.
  • In 2006 (after moving the monument from 1973), another monument was erected in front of the old town hall.
  • In 2011, on the occasion of his 400th birthday, a Hevelius year was celebrated in Poland.

factories

See also

literature

web links

Commons : Johannes Hevelius  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

itemizations

  1. ↑ As with Nikolaus Kopernikus , Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit and other German-speaking scientists from the area to which Poles and Germans made political claims at different times, variants of the name from both languages ​​also coexist for Hevelius.
  2. ↑ Jan Heweliusz teleskop.pl (Polish)
  3. ↑ Thomas Bassen: The Danziger Jopenbier. In: Mojito Papers. Retrieved September 3, 2021 .
  4. ↑ Irena Kampa: The astronomical instruments of Johannes Hevelius . In: Nuncius Hamburgensis . tape 47 . Tredition, Hamburg 2018, ISBN 978-3-7469-2787-9 .
  5. ↑ [1]
  6. ↑ Dieter W. Leitner: 400 years ago Johannes Hevelius was born in Danzig . In: Arge Danzig. Working group for the care and research of Danzig philately (ed.): Literature supplement . No. 165 , 24 November 2011, p. 1–4 ( danzig.org ).
  7. ↑ a b Nick Kanas: Star Maps. History, Artistry, and Cartography. Springer, 2019, ISBN 978-3-030-13612-3 , p. 139.
  8. ↑ a b Danzig: Celebration of the 400th birthday of Johannes Hevelius. In: Travel news online. January 11, 2011, retrieved September 3, 2021 .
  9. ↑ Philipp Eichhoff: The double Hevelius. In: In old and new cities. Retrieved September 3, 2021 .
  10. ↑ Minor Planet Circ. 24122
  11. ↑ Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering & Technology: Hevelius, Johannes. Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia. Gdansk, 1690.
personal data
SURNAME Hevelius, John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hevel, Johannes; Hewelcke, Johann; Heweliusz, Jan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION astronomer
BIRTH DATE January 28, 1611
PLACE OF BIRTH Gdansk
DATE OF DEATH January 28, 1687
PLACE OF DEATH Gdansk