Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Heath, Thomas

1412834Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 25 — Heath, Thomas1891Robert Edward Anderson

HEATH, THOMAS (fl. 1583), mathematician, born in London, was admitted probationer fellow of All Souls, Oxford, in 1567, and proceeded B.A. 1569, and M.A. 1573 (Oxf. Univ. Reg., Oxf. Hist. Soc., i. 270). Wood dates his master's degree in 1579 (Fasti, i. 213). Heath won considerable repute for his knowledge of astronomy and physics, and denounced the astrological predictions of Richard Harvey [q. v.] in his ‘Manifest and Apparent Confutation of an Astrological Discourse lately published to the discomfort (without cause) of the weak and simple sort.’ With that ‘Confutation’ was bound up his ‘Brief Prognostication or Astronomical Prediction of the Conjunction of the two superiour Planets Saturn and Jupiter, which shall be in 1583, April 29,’ London, 1583. Both parts were dedicated to Sir George Carey, ‘knight marshal of the queen's household.’ Heath was a friend of John Dee [q. v.] and Thomas Allen (1542–1632) [q. v.]

[Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), i. 498; Tanner, p. 409.]

R. E. A.