Godefroy Wendelin
Godefroy Wendelin, Latinized Vendelinus, ( born June 6 1580 Herk- de -Stad as Govaert Wendelen, † October 24, 1667 in Ghent ) was a Belgian astronomer.
Life and work
He went to his home to school, from 1595 on Jesuit College in Tournai and then to the university in Leuven, where Justus Lipsius ( 1547-1606 ) and puteanus ( 1574-1646 ), later his close friend, his teachers were. He then went traveling and was from 1604 to 1611 in Provence, where he worked at the court of the seneschal of Forcalquier as a tutor for the son of André d' Arnaud, Seigneur de Miravail and lieutenant general. He led astronomical observations in Châteauneuf- Miravail, from the Chateau des Graves and on the Montagne de Lure and collection of Contrat. For example, he observed an eclipse in 1605.
In 1619 he was ordained a priest in Brussels and worked as a priest from 1620 to 1632 in Geetbets and from 1633 to 1648 in Herk In 1648 he was until his retirement in 1658 at the Cathedral of Tournai.
He defended (despite condemnation by the church), the heliocentric world view in his Tetralogia Cometica of 1653 ( as in his book Eclipses lunares of 1644). With Johan Philip Lansberg he was one of the earliest representatives of the Copernican theory in the southern Netherlands.
By 1630 he determined by the method of Aristarchus of Samos the relative distance of the Moon and Earth, where he came to a ratio of 243. In truth, this is 384 and Aristarchus found in antiquity about 20
From observations of the moons of Jupiter, he confirmed in 1648 for their outstanding Kepler's third law. This was made known by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Battista Riccioli 1651st After Pierre Costabel Wendelin used this observational data of Nicolas- Claude Fabri de Peiresc of 1610. Regardless took Johannes Kepler in 1622, that his third law is applicable to the moons of Jupiter. The verifiability, however, was limited due to uncertainties related to the semi-major axes of the orbits. Wendelin determined the width of Marseille and undertook length provisions in connection to Peiresc.
He corresponded with Michel Coignet, Marin Mersenne, Pierre Gassendi and Constantijn Huygens.
The lunar crater Vendelinus is named after him.
Works
- Loxias seu de obliquitate solis, Antwerp 1626
- Aries seu Aurei Velleris encomium, 1632
- De tetracty Pythagorae dissertatio epistolica, ad Erycium Puteanum, 1637
- Arcanorum caelestium Lampas τετράλυχνος, Brussels 1643
- Eclipses lunares from anno 1573 ad 1643 observatae, Antwerp 1644
- Leges salicae illustratae, Antwerp 1649
- Teratologia cometica 1652
- De causis naturalibus, pluviae purpureae Bruxellensis, London 1655
- Arcanorum caelestium Sphinx Oedipus et seu Lampas δωδεκράλυχνος, Tournai 1658