Copernicus, Nicholas
ko-per'ni-kus, Nicholas, (1473-1543), a celebrated astronomer. A native of Thorn, Poland. Of German ancestry. He studied at Cracow, Bologna, and Padua. Copernicus was a professor of mathematics at Rome, 1501, and later he became canon of a cathedral under his bishop uncle, his mother's brother. Taking the hints given by Pythagoras, Copernicus spent several years in studying the apparent motions of the heavenly bodies, and wrote a treatise, first published at Nuremberg in 1543 giving proof that the earth and planets move around the sun as a center. In deference to the Church of Rome, then committed to the opposite theory, Copernicus dedicated his book to the pope and put forth his theory as a mild suggestion with such proofs as had occurred to him. The central statement of the work is this: "The earth is not the center of the universe. It is only a satellite of the sun." It is needless to say that the "Copernican System" was rejected promptly by the authorities of the day. It is said, on what authority we do not know, that Copernicus received the first copy of his book fresh from Nuremberg the day he died. A crater, 56 miles in width, of an extinct volcano in the moon has been named Copernicus in honor of the great astronomer.