Tadeáš Hájek

Thaddaeus Hagecius from Hayek ( Czech Tadeáš Hájek z Hájku, also Thaddeus Nemicus ) ( born December 1, 1525 Prague, † September 1, 1600, ibid ), was an astronomer and personal physician of Rudolph II

Life

The son of Šimon Hájek came from an old family in Prague. 1548 to 1549 he taught medicine and astronomy in Vienna. In 1551 he took the examination as Master of Arts. Three years later he continued his studies in Bologna and attended from 1554 the lectures of Girolamo Cardano of Milan. After his return to Prague he worked as a professor of mathematics and astronomy at the University of Prague. 1558 he left the university opened a medical practice and moved calendar and horoscopes. His reputation was so good that the Emperor Maximilian II and Rudolf II appointed William as personal physician. 1566, during the Turkish wars, he had as head physician to Vienna and Hungary. He was raised to the peerage in 1554 by Ferdinand I, Maximilian I beat him in 1571 knighted. Hagecius was married three times and had three sons and a daughter.

The lunar crater Hagecius and the asteroid (1995 ) Hajek named after him.

Work

Hagecius, the largest Czech scientists of the 16th century, published the first positioning of the stars in their passage through the meridian. Later he devoted himself to the calculation of planetary motion and cometary research; yet he also wrote a treatise on the Halley 's Comet. He specified the parallaxes and was one of the ten European astronomers who described the 1572 observations is now known as SN 1572 supernova in the constellation Cassiopeia scientifically correct.

He was also the author of numerous astronomical and medical writings. In the history of mathematics, he enrolled for his publication " De laudibus geometriae ". This is a book that traces the history of the Bohemian mathematics precisely.

He took measurements before in Prague and was co-author of the map of 1563, which was now lost.

Hagecius was involved in the " Herbarium " of Pietro Andrea Mattioli, in which he added the botanical conditions in Bohemia, at the factory, for the Czech edition translated at the Georg Melantrich appeared in 1562 by Aventine. He wrote in 1585 a treatise on the manufacture of beer, " De ratione cerevisia eiusque conficiendi ". At his urging, Tycho Brahe and Johannes Kepler was invited to Prague. With them and other top scientists in Europe, he maintained a lively correspondence.

Person

In addition to astronomy and mathematics, he worked on botany, Geodesy and alchemy. He was interested in political and religious matters, participated in the cultural life and was a secret supporter of the Moravian Church. He met with the prominent humanists of the 16th century such as Philipp Melanchthon. With his poems, he joined the group around Jan Hodějovský z Hodějova, a patron of published works in Latin Bohemian authors.

Writings

• Thaddaeus Hagecius from Hayck. Dialexis de novae et prius incognitae stellae inusitatae magnitudinis & splendidissimi luminis apparitione, & de eiusdem stellae vero loco constituendo, Frankfurt / Main, 1574 Reprint, edited by Zdenek Horsky, Prague, 1967 ( review of reprints )
• Thaddaeus from Hayck: De investigatione loci novae stellae in zodiaco. In: Bartholomew rice Acher: De Mirabili novae ac splendidis stellae, Mense Nouembri anni 1572, primum conspectæ, ac etiam nunc apparentis, Phœnomeno. Vienna 1573 ( digitized )