The First Copernican: Georg Joachim Rheticus and the Rise of the Copernican Revolution [Hardcover]

Dennis Danielson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 31, 2006

In May, 1539, a young, German mathematician named Georg Joachim Rheticus traveled hundreds of miles across Europe in the hopes of meeting and spending a few days with the legendary astronomer, Nicolas Copernicus, in Frombork, Poland. Two and a half years later, Rheticus was still there, fascinated by what he was discovering, but largely engaged in trying to convince Copernicus to publish his masterwork--De revolutionibus (On the Revolutions of the Heavens), the first book to posit that the sun was the center of the universe.  That he was finally able to do so just as Copernicus was dying became a turning point for science and civilization.  That he then went on to a legendary career of his own--he founded the field of trigonometry, for example--will be one of the many surprises in this eye-opening book, which will restore Rheticus to his rightful place in the history of science.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The publication of Copernicus's theories on the structure of the solar system is a touchstone of the scientific revolution. But as Danielson shows in this fascinating account, Copernicus's work might have been lost without the assistance of a passionate young scholar named Georg Joachim Rheticus. Born in 1514, Rheticus, a German doctor's son, became a protégé of the mathematician Melanchthon, who said the youth was "born to study mathematics." Made a professor at the University of Wittenberg at the age of 22, Rheticus took a leave of absence in 1538 to track down Copernicus in Poland. Rheticus had seen a copy of a narrowly circulated short paper by Copernicus about a solar system with a stationary Sun and moving Earth, and had become obsessed with the idea. Although in his twilight years, the elder scientist welcomed the younger man, who persuaded him to pull his notes together to create his paradigm-breaking work, On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres. Drawing on academic records and papers, Danielson, a professor of English at the University of British Columbia, gracefully recounts the compelling story of a scientist whose "sole interest was in reflecting, not deflecting, the light that shone from the mind of his teacher." B&w illus. (Nov.)
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About the Author

Dennis Danielson is a professor of English at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC.  He has served as a member of the History-of-Astonomy Committee for the Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum in Chicago, and is a member of the Historical Astronomy division of the American Astronomical Society. His articles have appeared in the American Journal of Physics and the Journal for the History of Astronomy. He is the editor of the acclaimed anthology of cosmological writings, The Book of the Cosmos. He lives in Vancouver, BC.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Walker & Company (October 31, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0802715303
• ISBN-13: 978-0802715302
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,780,147 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A good read, December 16, 2006

By 

H. D. Saunders (Danville, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The First Copernican: Georg Joachim Rheticus and the Rise of the Copernican Revolution (Hardcover)

This book is delightful and fun to read and anyone interested in the history of scientific discovery will enjoy it. Danielson manages to bring to vivid life the story of Copernicus's great insight, how it survived the political, religious, and academic obstacles of its time to reach the hands of other scholars, and how the Copernicus manuscript might never have come down to us at all but for Rheticus, who himself was the founder of modern trigonometry.

While this is a very well-researched and scholarly book, I liked how Danielson brings the story alive, complete with the intrigue of the university politics and the national politics of the day. The author places you in the time. You feel the influence of Luther and Erasmus, patrons of the sciences, clerics of different stripes, dukes and mayors, and large scientific figures. And, for me what was interesting, the role of various competing academic institutions in the emerging nation-states of the Renaissance. That, and the story of all the tenuous links that must be secured before a great scientific idea comes to be accepted.

Danielson makes the personalities real: their intellectual struggles, what drives them, and their foibles. In particular, I found myself outraged at the academic treachery of Osiander, who sullied the first publication of the Copernican manuscript. And readers will find a soap opera element in the charges faced by Rheticus for allegedly molesting a male student.

Overall, I would recommend this book to anyone who would like to know the story of how the Copernican revolution began.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A rewarding read, March 24, 2010

By 

B. Vincent Jr. (BEAVERTON, OR USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The First Copernican: Georg Joachim Rheticus and the Rise of the Copernican Revolution (Hardcover)

Rheticus's indispensible role in helping Nicolaus Copernicus get his great book finished and published at the end of his life is well known in the history of science. "No Rheticus, No Copernicus." Building on German sources and scholarship, what author Dennis Danielson provides here is the fuller story of the young German mathematician's career and legacy to the Copernican Revolution. He illuminates Rheticus's contributions both before and after the publication of Copernicus's seminal book.

Prof. Danielson explains for the first time what spurred Rheticus to do what he did and what became of him after his teacher died with Rheticus not yet thirty, and to some extent even how "his subsequent trigonometric research connected with his heroic mission as the first Copernican." One of the interesting suggestions in the book for me was that Rheticus's geometrical emphasis toward astronomy was the substantive connection between Copernicus and Kepler, that it ignited the development of the celestial mechanics to which Kepler devoted his life. Rheticus's posthumously published trig tables were extensive and accurate enough to be used for astronomical computation into the early twentieth century. "Rheticus thus played a critical role not only in launching but also in extending the Scientific Revolution."

This book is not a fast read, but it's a rewarding read. I found myself underlining and reflecting a lot. Its 264 pages includes interesting appendices, endnotes, and index. A nice contribution to the history of the Scientific Revolution.

Along with Thomas Kuhn's masterful The Copernican Revolution: Planetary Astronomy in the Development of Western Thought and Owen Gingerich's facetiously titled The Book Nobody Read: Chasing the Revolutions of Nicolaus Copernicus, anyone seriously interested in the context surrounding how Copernicus launched modern astronomy would do well to have this book by Danielson in their library.

0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Flawed, August 22, 2010

By 

R. Knapp (MT USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The First Copernican: Georg Joachim Rheticus and the Rise of the Copernican Revolution (Hardcover)

I thought I had discovered something. I got jazzed about Rheticus and how he worked. I imagined his ultimate obscurity to be a glitch in history. I.e., great ideas are often attributed to the promoter rather than the creator. Yep, that's a romantic sentiment fueled by literature & movies. I got interested in the obelisk, which Rheticus lauded as 'The Key'. I was all set to try to emulate his techniques and sing praises to its great contributions as a scientific instrument. I picked up on Danielson's slant and enthusiasm, romanitic and sensational. This is where the book goes wrong. What is needed is a book that focusses on where Rheticus went wrong and why he is obscure, neglected, even scorned.

I started to research the obelisk as a scientific instrument, and came up empty-handed. Then I got a copy of "Obelisk: a History" (Curran, et al., 2009, The Burndy Library, Cambridge MA). This book points out that the secret of the obelisk is that it serves all purposes to all people. This book attributes two paragraphs to Rheticus, one sentence of which lauds him for publication of Copernicus' "Narratio primo". Following such a profound coup, perhaps it went to his head, Rheticus followed a path of "speculative natural science and alchemy". He was absorbed in mysticism & astrology. Scientifically, he regressed rather than progressed. These things were being left behind in science. Yet, Rheticus had such a damning influence that Kepler, in 1627, felt compelled to publicly address & refute Rheticus' theories. The obelisk, as an astronomical instrument, may have been used by Copernicus, but Copernicus' discovery was not new & better measurement. It was interpretation of known data. Rheticus felt Byzantine methodology, the way of the ancients, was the secret. I can imagine he felt they had discovered lost Truth, and what he had to do was replicate their accomplishment.

I suspect Rheticus, too, was romantic and sensational. It was his mission to redirect (misdirect, as it turns out) scientific effort. Rheticus' personal life was disreputable. Perhaps his professional motivations were self-serving and direputable. Rheticus, rightfully, gets credit for getting Copernicus published. Beyond that, he was a disreputable thorn to Enlightenment. To achieve scientific progress required that he be disreputed and disavowed. He earned obscurity, and that idea could make a great book. Danielson's interpretation is skewed. Because I fell into it also, I can understand the seductiveness of Rheticus, and Kepler's frustration with him.

Danielson's book seems well-researched and is worth reading for its thorough exposure of Rheticus. It is not an easy read. Yet, as is evident in this review, I have gotten a lot from having read it.