letter, dated 2nd January 1598, in which Tycho stated that he had been obliged to leave his country and had come to Germany, where he hoped it might be granted him to complete his labours under the auspices of the Emperor.[1] About the same time Tycho sent magnificently bound copies of the star-catalogue to the Archduke Matthias, to the Vice-Chancellor Corraducius, to Wolfgang Theodore, Archbishop of Salzburg,[2] the Bishop of Lübeck, and to other influential men in Austria and Germany, to the King of Denmark, Prince Maurice of Orange,[3] Joseph Scaliger,[4] Magini, Kepler, two years later to the Elector of Saxony, &c. As already remarked, the Progymnasmata, which was not published until after Tycho's death, only contained 777 stars, but Kepler in 1627 published the thousand star-places in his Tabulæ Rudolphinæ; while it is most significant that Longomontanus, Tycho's principal assistant, in his Astronomia Danica, only inserted the 777 stars, doubtless because he knew well how worthless the additional star-places were. The handsome manuscript volumes entitled "Tychonis Brahe Stellarum octavi orbis inerrantium accurata restitutio, Wandesburgi, Anno CIƆIƆIIC," were chiefly intended as advertisements, and it would be perfect waste of time to collate the various copies with a view to correcting Kepler's edition.[5]
When Tycho sent a copy of this catalogue to King Christian,[6] he probably also sent a letter to the king, of
- ↑ Printed in Breve og Aktstykker, p. 31 (from two draughts in the University Library at Basle).
- ↑ This is the copy which afterwards came into the possession of Gassendi, who gives (pp. 257–259) a list of remarkable discrepancies between star-places in it and in the Tab. Rudolph.
- ↑ Astron. Jahrbuch fur 1786, p. 216.
- ↑ This copy is now in the University Library at Leyden ("Descriptio stellarum octavi orbis inerrantium"). There is a copy of the catalogue in the Bodleian Library, presented to a Venetian nobleman.
- ↑ As suggested by Baily in his reprint of the catalogue, Mem. R. Astron. Soc., xiii.; compare his Account of the Rev. J. Flamsteed, p. 368.
- ↑ Now in the Royal Library, Copenhagen. In a letter from Henrik Ramel
