and was observed from the 23rd February to the 6th March inclusive, the declination with the armillæ, altitudes and azimuths with a quadrant, and distances with a sextant. The time determinations are numerous.[1] In July and August 1593 a comet appeared near the northern horizon. It was not observed at Hveen, but only by a former pupil of Tycho's, Christen Hansen, from Ribe in Jutland, who at that time was staying at Zerbst in Anhalt. He had only a radius with him, and his observations were therefore not better than those made by the generality of observers in those days.[2] The last comet observed at Hveen was that of 1596, which was first seen by Tycho at Copenhagen on the 14th July, south of the Great Bear. It was not properly observed till after his return home on the 17th, and then only on three nights. It was last seen on the 27th July.[3]
The star of 1572 and the comets observed at Hveen had cleared the way for the restoration of astronomy by helping to destroy old prejudices, and Tycho therefore resolved to write a great work on these recent phenomena which should embody all results of his observations in any way bearing on them. The first volume he devoted to the new star, but as the corrected star places which were necessary for the reduction of the observations of 1572–73 involved researches on the motion of the sun, on refraction, precession, &c., the volume gradually assumed greater proportions than was originally contemplated, and was never quite finished in Tycho's
- ↑ Orbit computed by Hind, Astr. Nachr., xxv. p. 111.
- ↑ Orbit by Lacaille, in Pingré's Cométographie, i. p. 560.
- ↑ Orbits by Hind and Valz, Astr. Nachr., xxiii. pp. 229 and 383; the observations are published ibid., p. 371 et seq. Pingré gives the results of most of the observations of the seven comets from a copy of them which is still preserved at the Paris Observatory. A complete edition of all the observations was published in 1867 at Copenhagen, under the supervision of D'Arrest, Tychonis Brahe Dani Observationes Septem Cometarum. Nunc primum edidit F. R. Friis. 4to.
