JHA, xxxvi (2005)

TYCHO v. URSUS: THE BUILD-UP TO A TRIAL, PART 1

NICHOLAS JARDINE, University of Cambridge,

DIETER LAUNERT, Gelehrtenschule, Meldorf,
ALAIN SEGONDS, CNRS - Observatoire de Paris,
ADAM MOSLEY, University of Swansea, and
KARIN TYBJERG, University of Cambridge

I: Introduction
NICHOLAS JARDINE, ALAIN SEGONDS and ADAM MOSLEY

Much has been written about the prolonged conflict between Tycho Brahe and
Nicolaus Raimarus Ursus.' The extent of the secondary literature is unsurprising,
for the copious primary sources generated by the Tycho-Ursus controversy offer
an extraordinary range of insights into the theory and practices of astronomy in
the period. For example, Kepler's Apologia pro Tychone contra Ursum (hereafter
Contra Ursum), composed in the months around Christmas 1600, is a rich source of
information about contemporary views On the status of astronomical hypotheses, on
the duties of an astronomer, and on the origins and development of the discipline.'
As often happens with disputes, the controversy provoked the combatants to spell
out assumptions and norms of conduct that would most probably have remained
tacit under more peaceable circumstances. In particular, it reveals much about the
roles of publications, marginalia, letters, instruments and models in the practice of
astronomy and the establishment of priority claims.' Besides, the story is a gripping
one in which there is dramatic interplay between the sharply contrasting personalities
of Tycho, Ursus and Kepler.
From his receipt ofUrsus's defamatory De astronomicis hypothesibus early in 1598
up to his death in 1601, Tycho made great efforts to secure a formal legal condemna-
tion of Ursus and his book. Tycho's correspondence, together with two legal docu-
ments, published by Christian Frisch in the first of the eight VOlumes of his edition
of Kepler's works, tell us much about the preparations for the trial.' However, until
very recently it has remained unclear precisely what evidence in support of which
charges Tycho had assembled. Further, though there are indications in Tycho's cor-
respondence that Ursus had put up some defence against Tycho's legal onslaught,
very little was known about the nature of this resistance. The brief articles that follow
deal with recently discovered primary sources that cast much light on these obscure
matters. By way of introduction to them, we first offer a brief overview of the case
of Tycho versus Ursus.'
In 1588 Tycho Brahe outlined a geo-heliocentric world-system in his De mundi
aetherei recentioribus phaenomenis, published at his own press at Uraniburg.
Later that year another sketch for a geo-heliocentric system appeared in Ursus's

0021-8286/05/3601-0081/$10.00 © 2005 Science History Publications Ltd

82 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

Fundamentum astronomicum, published at Strasbourg." The proposals were signifi-

cantly different: in Tycho's the Earth is at rest, there is a definite outermost sphere
of stars, and the paths of Mars and the Sun intersect; in that of Ursus there is a
diurnal rotation of the Earth, the fixed stars are at variable distances, the finitude of
the universe is undecidable, and the path of Mars encloses that of the Sun. In neither
case were parameters of planetary models specified, something which both authors
proposed to produce on subsequent occasions.'
Much of the testimony relating to the origins of the two world-systems is of
highly questionable value, generated as it was in the course of the subsequent prior-
ity dispute. Thus Tycho was later to suggest that his new world-system had been
occasioned by his observations of the parallax of Mars in 1582. But it seems that
he was backdating this discovery, perhaps to confirm his priority over Ursus; for
Gingerich and Voelkel have argued most convincingly that it was not until the spring
of 1587 that Tycho obtained parallax measurements that persuaded him that when
in opposition Mars is nearer to the Earth than is the Sun," Ursus claimed that he had
thought up his new world system on 1 October 1585;9 while, as we shall see, Tycho
claimed that Ursus had stolen the hypotheses from him in September 1584, when
visiting Hven in the retinue of Tycho's kinsman Eric Lange. At all events, early in
1586 Ursus did communicate geo-heliocentric hypotheses to Georg Rollenhagen,
Rector of the gymnasium at Magdeburg, and later that year he stayed at Kassel, where
Jost Biirgi, instrument-and clock-maker to Landgraf Wilhelm IV of Hesse-Kassel,
made a model of the Ursine system. In 1587 he presented the system in lectures at
the Strasbourg Academy. 10
The first news that Tycho received about Ursus's claims to hypotheses similar to
his own came in the summer of 1588, in the garbled form of a report to the effect
that his hypotheses had been communicated by a run-away servant of his to "another
mathematician"." Shortly afterwards he obtained a copy of Ursus's Fundamentum
astronomicum, then a direct report from Rollenhagen about Ursus's presentation
of hypotheses at Magdeburg." Tycho's first known reaction was in a letter of 4
November 1588 to a friend from his student days, the professor of astronomy at
Rostock, Henrich van den Brock (Brucaeus), in which he charged Ursus with having
stolen the hypotheses during his visit to Hven, perhaps by copying from a defective
diagram." A few weeks later, in a letter to Heinrich Rantzau, Royal Governor of
Schleswig-Holstein, Tycho had hardened this into a definite accusation of copying
from a diagram in which the path of Mars had accidentally been drawn enclosing
that of the Sun. 14
Special interest attaches to the communications between Christoph Rothmann,
Mathematician to Wilhelm IV, and Tycho concerning Ursus and the new world-
system; for it was the publication of many of these by Tycho in Epistolae astro-
nomicae in 1596 that provoked open conflict with Ursus. Writing in August 1586
Rothmann had reported to Tycho how "that dirty rascal" Ursus had spoken insult-
ingly about him at Kassel." In a letter of 13 October 1588, Rothmann mentioned
a model made for him by Biirgi of the "inverted" Copernican hypotheses, and he
 Tycho v. Ursus 83

wondered how Tycho's hypotheses differed from them." In his reply of 21 Febru-
ary 1589 - evidently supposing the model of the inverted Copernican hypotheses
described by Rothmann to be the same as the model of Ursus's system described in
Fundamentum astronomicum - Tycho embarked on a full denunciation of Ursus.
He reminded Rothmann of his earlier description of Ursus as a "dirty rascal", he
reiterated the story of the copying of a defective diagram, and he added that other
matters in Ursus's Fundamentum astronomicum had been "scraped together, partly
from you, partly from other German mathematicians"."
Even before he encountered these insults and accusations in Epistolae astro-
nomicae, Ursus had almost certainly got wind of Tycho's attacks. Thus, the Impe-
rial Vice-Chancellor, Jacob Kurz (Curtius), on whose recommendation Ursus was
appointed Imperial Mathematician in 1591, had in a letter to Tycho of 28 January 1590
referred to Ursus as "your plagiarist"; and Ursus was certainly aware of this letter,"
Moreover, in a postscript of 14 March 1592 to a letter of 1591 to Ursus's colleague
at Court, the Imperial Physician Thaddeus Hayek (Hagecius), Tycho had spelled out
in unprecedented detail the story of Ursus's furtive and suspicious behaviour during
his visit to Hven in 1584. 19
Tycho's Epistolae astronomicae was published "with the privileges of the Emperor
and certain other Kings".20 On 1 June 1597 Ursus wrote to his master, the Emperor,
seeking permission for a forthcoming work in which he would demonstrate both his
innocence of the charge of plagiarism and his superiority to Tycho as a mathemati-
cian. This document, recently discovered by Dieter Launert, forms the subject matter
of the second in the present collection of articles."
In July 1597 Ursus's savage counterattack on Tycho, De astronomicis hypothesibus,
appeared at Prague. Even by the ferocious standards of early-modem invective and
satire, this was a venomous work. Ursus, a former swineherd attacking a member of
the high nobility, was shrewd in his choice of targets: Tycho's duel-disfigured nose;
the propriety of his marriage; the vanity displayed by him in prefacing Epistolae astro-
nomicae with poems obsequiously flattering to himself; the feebleness of his chums to
expertise in the doctrine of triangles. On the key issue of plagiarism Ursus maintained
that Tycho's hypotheses had been anticipated in Antiquity by Apollonius of Perga;
and, moreover, that they were explicitly described in Copernicus's De revolutionibus
on the basis of an account of them in Martianus Capella's "Encyclopedia", that is,
De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii. He also argued that astronomical hypotheses are
not to be regarded as portrayals of the true form of the cosmos, something we can
never hope to know, but as fictions easily contrived for the purpose of saving the
celestial phenomena. For good measure, he emended his own hypotheses to specify
intersection of the paths of Mars and the Sun. 22
Evidently Ursus had failed to secure the Imperial privilege that he had requested.
For with extraordinary audacity, the title page of De astronomicis hypothesibus
declares "without any privilege". Further, no printer is named, and the date of the
introductory letter is given only in the form of an astronomical riddle. The third of
the following articles tracks down the printer and the fourth solves the riddle.
84 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

Having incurred royal disfavour, Tycho left Denmark in June 1597. From Septem-
ber 1597 he was lodged at Wandsburg Castle as the guest of Heinrich Rantzau." There,
in the spring of 1598, he received copies of Ursus's De astronomicis hypothesibus:
one from a concerned student at Helmstedt, which he mislaid; the other from Georg
Rollenhagen." Tycho was at the time negotiating with a view to entering the service
of the Emperor, so such an attack from the Imperial Mathematician must have been
peculiarly unwelcome. In April 1598 Tycho wrote to Kepler responding in amicable
and encouraging terms to Kepler's gift of his Mysterium cosmographicum. He also
denounced De astronomicis hypothesibus, rebutting Ursus's attack on the originality
of his hypotheses. Further, he expressed surprise at the obsequious letter published
by Ursus in De astronomicis hypothesibus, in which Kepler had declared his admira-
tion for Ursus's hypotheses; and he asked Kepler to let him know what he thought
of the "virulent book"." Probably at about the same time, Tycho wrote about De
astronomicis hypothesibus to Hayek, a staunch supporter of his cause at the Imperial
Court. Tycho declared his intention to seek the Emperor's approval for legal action
against Ursus and the publisher of the book, and he sought Hayek's advice on the
best way to approach the matter. 26
In the course of May 1598 Tycho obtained two testimonials relating to Ursus's
alleged theft of hypotheses. One, from Christen Hansen (Johannis), who had worked
with Tycho on Hven, testified to the printing of De mundi aetherei recentioribus
phaenomenis at the end of 1587 - that is, well before Ursus's publication of geo-
heliocentric hypotheses in Fundamentum astronomicum; and it refuted Ursus's charge
that Tycho's hypotheses had been anticipated by Apollonius ofPerga. It also offered
an account, evidently based entirely on hearsay, of Ursus's suspicious behaviour
during his visit to Hven." The second of the testimonials was a formal affidavit by
Michael Walther, secretary to Eric Lange. This offered detailed first-hand testimony
to Ursus' s suspicious and deranged behaviour during his visit to Hven and afterwards
at Lange's residence, Bygholm Castle."
In September 1598 Tycho was called to Prague. In October 1598, en route to
Prague, he was at Magdeburg. There he met Eric Lange, who reluctantly confirmed
Walther's testimony. Lange also testified concerning a series of specific claims made
by Ursus in De astronomicis hypothesibusP Lange's testimony is lost; however, in
the fifth of the following articles it is argued that the issues on which Lange testified
are marked in the copy of Ursus's De astronomicis hypothesibus at the National
Library of Medicine and Natural Sciences, Copenhagen.
Ursus and the printer of De astronomicis hypothesibus may not have been the only
targets of Tycho's quest for legal vengeance. In the sixth ofthe following articles we
consider a letter which shows that Tycho had been making inquiries about Joachim
Rosalechius, whose poem in De astronomicis hypothesibus praising Ursus is headed
with a couplet grossly insulting to Tycho.
By January 1599 Tycho appears to have been confident of the outcome of his pro-
ceedings against Ursus, for he wrote from Wittenberg to his former student Christian
Serensen (Longomontanus) asking whether he would be interested in taking up the
 Tycho v. Ursus 85

post that Ursus was about to vacate." Tycho's move to Prague was delayed until June
1599 by an outbreak of plague in the city. On arrival Tycho sent two lawyers and
a notary to Ursus's house, seeking a recantation of the insults of De astronomicis
hypothesibus. Ursus refused, submitting everything to the decision of the judges
(or so Tycho recalled in a letter written later in the year, after Ursus's death)." By
September Tycho had engaged a lawyer to institute proceedings, but no legal action
had yet been undertaken. He had also appealed for condemnation of Ursus's book
to the Archbishop of Prague, responsible for the licensing of books published in the
city, who had promised his support."
In the meantime, Tycho had received a copious formal apology from Kepler for
his misguided youthful adulation of Ursus. In the course of the letter Kepler offered
to deliver a "public judgement" of Ursus's calumnies once he had seen the book."
On 9 December Tycho wrote to Kepler, inviting him in the most cordial terms to join
him in Prague." He again fiercely defended his priority over Ursus. In a postscript
he reported on his preparations for Ursus's trial; and he sent copies of the testimoni-
als of Hansen and Walther. In January 1600 Kepler, who had not received Tycho's
invitation, came to Prague." There, as he was later to record, he met Ursus and told
him that he would take Tycho's side in the dispute." Three weeks after his arrival he
joined Tycho at Benatky Castle. During his stay there, he composed an adjudication
of the dispute between Tycho and Ursus for Franz Tengnagel von Camp, a member
of Tycho's familia and his future son-in-law." In it he came out more openly than
before in support of Tycho on the issues of originality and plagiarism. The visit was
interrupted by a quarrel with Tycho, soon patched up, but only after Kepler had - to
Tycho's great annoyance - gone to Prague and there communicated with Ursus. In
June 1600 Kepler returned to Graz.
At some stage between Tycho's arrival in Prague and Ursus's death later that year,
four Imperial Commissioners were appointed by the Emperor to judge Tycho's case
against Ursus." This was evidently an Aktenversendung, the procedure laid down in
the Constitutio criminaLis Carolina of 1532, whereby a trial could be delegated to a
tribunal for judgement on the basis of affidavited documentary testimonials."
Ursus and his supporters did not take Tycho's onslaught lying down. As Tycho
reported to Kepler, there were some at Court who had delayed the appointment
of commissioners to examine the case." Moreover, as Tycho angrily informed his
noble friend Jan Jesensky (Jessenius), Ursus had presented a petition to the Imperial
Councillors at Pilsen (to which the court had retreated during the outbreak of plague
in Prague) complaining about Tycho's malicious behaviour. Tycho urged his friend
to obtain a copy of this." However, as shown in the seventh of the following articles,
Ursus published, and is likely to have distributed at Court, an anonymous pamphlet,
Demonstratio: Hipotheses motuum coelestium ... descriptas esse in reLictis monu-
mentis Martiani Capellae..., which accused "certain mathematicians" of arrogating
to themselves the hypotheses of Apollonius of Perga, as found in Martianus Capella
and Copernicus. Annotations in the only known copy identify Ursus as the author
and Tycho as the target. 42
86 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

Ursus had left Prague in July 1599, perhaps to escape Tycho's wrath (as Tycho
suggested), perhaps because he had fallen out with the Emperor over astrology (as
Launert has argued), perhaps to escape the plague." After making his complaint at
Pilsen, he stayed in Silesia. There he became seriously ill. Tycho was unforgiving
and alarmed at the possibility that Ursus might escape justice by dying." On 15
August 1600 Ursus died." He did so at the very moment, so Tycho told Kepler in
his letter of 28 August 1600, in which the summons to appear before the tribunal
was to be served on him." Tycho remained implacable. Through the Archbishop he
pursued his quest for condemnation of De astronomicis hypothesibus to a successful
conclusion: the stock was burned." Moreover, he was still determined to protect his
reputation by obtaining, and publishing, a condemnation of Ursus by the Imperial
Commissioners."
Two responses to Ursus's anonymous Demonstratio, both presumably prompted
by Tycho, have recently come to light. As reported in the eighth of the following
articles, there is to be found among the Kepler papers in St Petersburg a document
written by Johannes Muller, assistant to Tycho at Benatky from March 1600 to
May 1601, and formally notarized by Tycho's attorney, Johannes Fritsch. This is a
refutation of Ursus's claim in his Demonstratio that Tycho's hypotheses had been
anticipated by Martianus Capella. The fact that Tycho felt called on to prepare such
a legal document strongly suggests that Ursus had composed his pamphlet as a part
of his defence against the prosecution.
The second response to Ursus's Demonstratio is Kepler's. In his letter to Kepler
of 28 August 1600, Tycho also told of his plans to publish, alongside the findings of
the Commissioners, a reply to Ursus on the matters "which are mathematical and
concern hypotheses"; and he requested Kepler to provide him "soon with his views
on these matters". 49 When Kepler, driven from Graz by the persecution of Protestants
initiated by Archduke Ferdinand of Styria, returned to Prague in October 1600, it
was indeed upon him that the task of defending Tycho on these scores devolved.
Among the Kepler papers in St Petersburg is to be found a set of notes by Kepler
relating to the question of Tycho's priority in the discovery of his world system.
Volker Bialas has edited these under the title Ad Apologiam." Included is a bundle
of numbered observations which constitute a point by point refutation of Ursus's
anonymous pamphlet." The ninth and last in this collection of articles is devoted to
them. The remaining notes in Ad Apologiam are indeed preparations for Kepler's
famous Contra Ursum. This Kepler seems to have left uncompleted on his return
to Graz to settle his affairs in April 1601, and to have abandoned following Tycho's
death on 24 October 1601.52

Acknowledgements
The authors thank the British Academy and the Centre National de la Recherche
Scientifique for support of much of the work described in this series of articles.
 Tycho v. Ursus 87

REFERENCES
The following abbreviations are used throughout the present series of articles:
KGW =W. von Dyck, M. Caspar, et al. (eds), Johannes Kepler: Gesammelte Werke (22 vols to date;
Munich, 1938- ).
KOO = C. Frisch (ed.), Joannis Kepleri astronomi opera omnia (8 vols, Frankfurt and Erlangen,
1858-71).
Jardine, Kepler's A defence of Tycho = N. Jardine, The birth of history and philosophy of science:
Kepler's A defence of Tycho against Ursus with essays on its provenance and significance (Cambridge,
1984, rev. edn 1988).
Launert, Nicolaus Reimers = D. Launert, Nicolaus Reimers: Giinstling Rantzaus-Brahes Feind. Leben
und Werk (Munich, 1999).
Mosley, "Bearing the heavens" = A. Mosley, "Bearing the heavens: Astronomers, instruments and the
communication of astronomy in early-modern Europe", Ph.D. dissertation, Cambridge, 2000.
Rosen, Three Imperial Mathematicians = E. Rosen, Three Imperial Mathematicians: Kepler trapped
between Tycho Brahe and Ursus (New York, 1986).

TBOO = 1. L. E. Dreyer (ed.), Tychonis Brahe Dani opera omnia (15 vols, Copenhagen, 1913-29).

1. KOO, i, 215-87 (to which all subsequent accounts are indebted); J. L. E. Dreyer, Tycho Brahe: A
picture ofscientific life and work in the sixteenth century (Edinburgh, 1890),27, 183-4,268-76,
288-302; C. J. Schofield, Tychonic and semi- Tychonic world systems (New York, 1981), 108-39;
Jardine, Kepler's A defence ofTycho against Ursus, chaps. 1-5; O. Gingerich and R. S. Westman,
The Wittich connection: Conflict and priority in late sixteenth-century cosmology (Philadelphia,
PA. 1988),50-69; Rosen, Three Imperial Mathematicans; V.Thoren, The Lord of Uraniborg: A
biography ofTycho Brahe (Cambridge, 1990),260-1,390-9,432-9,453-61; Launert, Nicolaus
Reimers, 72-108, 285-365; Mosley, "Bearing the heavens".
2. On the significances of Contra Ursum, see, for example, N. Jardine, "The forging of modern realism:
Clavius and Kepler against the sceptics", Studies in history and philosophy ofscience, x (1979),
141-73; B. Eastwood, "Kepler as historian of science: Precursors of Copernican heliocentrism
according to De revolutionibus, I, 10", Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, cvi
(1982), 367-94; P. Barker and B. R. Goldstein, "Realism and instrumentalism in sixteenth-
century astronomy: A reappraisal", Perspectives on science, vi (1998), 232-58; R. Martens,
Kepler's philosophy and the new astronomy (Princeton, 2000), chap. 3; N. Jardine, "The many
significances of Kepler's Contra Ursum", in D. Di Liscia (ed.), Festschrift fur Volker Bialas,
Algorismus (in press).
3. See especially Gingerich and Westman, The Wittich connection (ref. I); Mosley, "Bearing the
heavens".
4. See KOO, i, 230-1. Translations of the two legal documents and of most of the relevant correspondence
are provided in Rosen, Three Imperial Mathematicians.
5. For very much fuller accounts of the course of the controversy, see Rosen, Three Imperial
Mathematicians; Gingerich and Westman, The Wittich connection (ref. I); M. A. Granada, EI
debate cosmologico en 1588: Bruno, Brahe, Rothmann, Ursus, Roslin (Naples, 1996); N. Jardine
and A. Segonds, Lo guerre des astronomes (Paris, forthcoming).
6. On Ursus's and Tycho's world systems, see S. K. Heninger, Jr, The cosmographical glass: Renaissance
diagrams ofthe universe (San Marino, CA, 1977),53-56; Schofield, Tychonic and semi- Tychonic
world systems (ref. I); Gingerich and Westman, The Wittich connection (ref. I); M. A. Granada,
EI debate cosmologico en 1588 (ref. 5).
7. Cf Fundamentum astronomicum, 4Ov.7-8, where Ursus hopes shortly to provide "a genuine and in
all its numbers most perfect and absolute astronomy"; and TBOO, iv, 157.35-37, where Tycho
88 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

defers a comprehensive and precise account to a projected work.

8. O. Gingerich and J. R. Voelkel, "Tycho Brahe's Copernican campaign", Journal for the history of
astronomy, xxix (1998), 1-34; see also B. Goldstein and P. Barker, "The role of Rothmann in
the dissolution of the celestial spheres", The British journal for the history of science, xxviii
(1995), 385-403.
9. Ursus, Fundamentum astronomicum, 37r:6-9; De astronomicis hypothesibus, Aii,r:32-35.
10. For details of Ursus's travels, sojourns and activities in this period, see Launert, Nicolaus Reimers,
23--67.
II. TBOO, vii, 125.20-40; 135.38-42.
12. TBOO, vii, 387.16-19.
13. TBOO, vii, 149.7-41.
14. TBOO, vii, 387.16-388.41.
15. TBOO, vi, 61.41--62.4. Hans Raeder and others following him have suggested that Tycho interpolated
this insulting reference to Ursus into the published version of the letter: see H. Raeder, "Om
Tycho Brahe's astronomiske brevvexling", Edda, xiv (1920), 103-17; Rosen, Three Imperial
Mathematicians, 225--6;Thoren, The Lord ofUraniborg (ref. 1),393-4. That Tycho was innocent
of this editorial impropriety is shown by A. Mosley, N. Jardine and K. Tybjerg, "Epistolary
culture, editorial practices, and the propriety of Tycho's Astronomical Letters", Journalfor the
history ofastronomy, xxxiv (2003),421-51.
16. TBOO, vi, 156.38-158.26.
17. TBOO, vi, 179.19-180.11. On Tycho's confusion on this score, see Mosley, "Bearing the heavens",
310--11.
18. The letter is cited by Ursus in De astronomicis hypothesibus, B,v; it was later published by Tycho
in his Mechanica with Ursus's name replaced by "N. N." (TBOO, v, 121.34-41). This most
probably stands for "Nomen Nescio", as applied to a person or work whose name should not
be mentioned. Another possibility is "Non Norninatus", quite commonly applied in the period
to anonymous works.
19. TBOO, vii, 321-326.37.
20. TBOO, vi, 3. On Tycho Brahe's privileges for this and other books, see Mosley, "Bearing the
heavens", 278-80.
21. Launert, Nicolaus Reimers, 343-51.
22. On Ursus's De astronomicis hypothesibus see Jardine, Kepler's A defence ofTycho, chap. 2; Launert,
Nicolaus Reimers, 285-320; and the third and fourth of the articles in the present collection.
23. On Tycho's peregrinations following his fall from grace, see Thoren, The Lord of Uraniborg (ref.
I), chap. II; J. R. Christianson, On Tycho's island: Tycho Brahe and his assistants, 1570-1601
(Cambridge, 2000), chap. 10.
24. TBOO, viii, 46.37-40; 50.36-51.6; 56.12-13.
25. TBOO, viii, 44-48; KGW, xiii, no. 92.
26. TBOO, viii, 56.28-30; 58.16-59.2.
27. KOO, i, 230; trans!. in Rosen, Three Imperial Mathematicians, 246-50. On Hansen, see Christianson,
On Tycho's island (ref. 23), 340--3.
28. KOO, i, 230--31; trans!' in Rosen, Three Imperial Mathematicians, 250--3.
29. TBOO, viii, 180.40--181.7; 210.35-42.
30. TBOO, viii, 136.13-15.
3 I. TBOO, viii, 371.11-28.
32. TBOO, viii, 181.12-18.
33. TBOO. viii, 141-4; KGW, xiii, no. 112.
34. TBOO. viii, 203-11; KGW, xiv, no. 145.
35. On Kepler's activities in this period, see M. Caspar, Kepler, trans!' and ed. by C. D. Hellman, with
bibliographical citations by O. Gingerich and A. Segonds (New York, 1993), 96-121.
 Tycho v. Ursus 89

36. Jardine, Kepler's A defence of Tycho, 86.24-29; KGW, xx/I, 18.9-12.

37. KOO, i, 281--4; KGW, xx/I, 66-96; trans!. in Jardine, Kepler's A defence of Tycho, 67-71.
38. TBOO, viii, 371.24-28.
39. See 1. H. Langbein, Prosecuting crime in the Renaissance: England, Germany, France (Cambridge,
MA, 1974), 198-202. We thank Julian Martin for advice on legal procedures in the period.
40. TBOO, viii, 343.35-36; KGW, xiv, no. 173.139--40.
41. TBOO, viii, 281.18-282.17.
42. See also Launert, Nicolaus Reimers, 343-50.
43. On the possible reasons for Ursus's withdrawal from Prague, see Launert, Nicolaus Reimers, 99.
44. TBOO, viii, 343.34-35; KGW, xiv, no. 173.138-9.
45. On the date and circumstances of Ursus's death see Launert, Nicolaus Reimers, 102-8.
46. TBOO, viii, 343.40--41; KGW, xiv, no. 173.143--4.
47. TBOO, viii, 344.2-7; TBOO, xiv, 209, no. 203.
48. TBOO, viii, 343.41-344.12.
49. TBOO, viii, 344.12-16; KGW, xiv, no. 173.158-161.
50. KGW, xxII, 70-82.
51. KGW, xxII, 70-72.
52. See Kepler's account of his activities in this period in a letter of 1605 to Serensen: KGW, xv, no.
323.192-203.

II: A letter of complaint against Tycho from Ursus to the Emperor

(1597)

DIETER LAUNERT

In August 1591 Ursus took up his post as Imperial Mathematician to Rudolf II

at Prague. He owed this position above all to the reputation he had acquired as a
competent mathematician and to the recommendation of Jacob Kurz (Curtius) von
Senftenau (1533-94), Vice-Chancellor and hence Head of the Chancellery of the
Imperial Court. I
From the summer of 1587 Ursus had been in Strasbourg, at the Academy (later
University). It was there that his Fundamentum astronomicum appeared in 1588. In
it he presented a geoheliocentric system, whose similarity to that of Tycho Brahe led
to the quarrel over plagiarism.' His claims were:
that the Earth is beyond doubt the centre of the world, but revolves daily on its
axis;
that the celestial vault with the fixed stars is immobile;
that the fixed stars are at various distances from the Earth;
that all the planets go round the Sun, which in turn moves around the Earth as a
centre; and
that a precession of the equinoxes is brought about by the precession of the Earth's
axis.
90 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

In his learned correspondence Tycho was quick to denounce Ursus as a plagiarist

and thief of his world system. Some of these letters were widely copied;' but it was not
until 1596 that Tycho published degrading and defamatory accusations of plagiarism
in his Epistolae astronomicae. There Ursus found himself publicly denounced by
Tycho and Rothmann as a "dirty rascal [impurus nebulo]", who had stolen Tycho's
astronomical hypothesis, and had derived most of the mathematics of his Funda-
mentum astronomicum from Rothmann and other German mathematicians.'
On or before 1 June 1597 Ursus wrote a letter to the Emperor, complaining about
the way in which in Epistolae astronomicae Tycho Brahe had out of envy defamed
and abused him, and in so doing had misused his Imperial privilege.' In addition,
Tycho had wrongly accused him of having stolen his hypotheses, despite the fact
that they are to be found in Copernicus and elsewhere. Ursus added that at the next
book fair he would publish a book defending himself, so that everyone would see
that the Emperor did not employ anyone at Court of the disreputable sort described
by Tycho.
In the course of the letter Ursus requested the "most gracious favour" of the
Emperor for his proposed response to Tycho's defamation. This was surely a peti-
tion for the Imperial privilege for the work. The underlining of this passage, the
noting of Ursus's name in the margin of the letter and the dating at the head of the
letter are likely to have been the work of a Chancellery official recording this as a
matter requiring decision. As we shall see in the next article, Ursus's response to
Tycho, De astronomicis hypothesibus, appeared in the following month. It was never
advertised at the Frankfurt book fair," Moreover, it had no Imperial privilege; indeed,
with unparalleled cheek Ursus openly declared the work as "without any privilege
[ABSQUE OMNI PRIVILEGIO]".
The manuscript ofUrsus's letter to the Emperor is preserved at the Haus-, Hof- und
Staatsarchiv, Vienna.' Here follow an English translation and transcription.
1 June 1597
I, your most humble servant, would not want to leave Your Imperial Majesty
lamenting the way in which the previously noble and most earnest Tycho Brahe,
the Danish astronomer, in his just published Astronomical letters, has out of
blatant envy and grudging jealousy attacked me in writing in a most harsh
and defamatory way, with many abusive words; and, in particular, has done so
rejoicing under the abused privilege of your Majesty. As if I would have stolen,
copied or cribbed by a philosophical theft," so to speak, his hypotheses (which
are, in fact, to be found explicitly in Copernicus? and are altogether different
from my recently published ones, which he nevertheless has the impudence to
pass off shamelessly as his own). Those [hypotheses] I, however, in a defence
to be published at the next book-fair, will clearly show and authentically prove
by demonstration to be different. Thus it should also be made clear and evident
at the same time which of the two of us is superior in the mathematical arts (if,
perhaps, not in mechanical astronomical practices). Consequently [I am] most
 Tycho v. Ursus 91

humbly requesting your Imperial Majesty on that account that this planned fair
and amusing response will attract and have your most gracious favour; thereby
justice would be done, in that it would be widely seen and perceived that your
Imperial Majesty would not, as my adversary declares, either maintain or receive
any such person in your own Court. For truly: "the mind conscious of virtue laughs
at the lies of tumour"." With most humble respects to Your Imperial Majesty
under the most gracious protection of the Divine Omnipotence.
Your Imperial Majesty's most humble servant and Mathematician,
Nicolaus Raimarus Ursus of Dithmarschen

1597116 11
Allerdurchleuchtigister Groj3mechtigister Khayser; Allergnedigister Herr und
Mecaenas, Eur Khay: [serliche] Mayesuu mag lch allerundertheniglichst klagendt
nicht laj3en, 12 wie dannermaj3ender Edle und Emtvheste Tycho Brahe Astronomus
Danicus in seinen itz: edirten Epistolis Astronomicis, aus lauterer invidia und
verbunstig abgunst, mich gar hartt und schier ehrenriihriger maefien mit vielen
schmehewortten in schreiben angegrijfen, und solchs fiimhemblich frauentlicb
unter E: Khay: May: gemi]3brauchetemprivilegio. AlfJ solte 1ch ihme quasifurto
quodam philosophico seine hypotheses (welche doch aufitrucklich im Copemico
stehenn, und omnino diversae a meis jam olim editis sein, die er aber unvor-
schampt pro suis zu venditieren sich understehet) entwendet, abgesehen oder
abgestolen habenn. Welchs aber lch in proximis Nundinis edendo Apologetico
Scripto anders zu sein demonstrando klerlich darthun und eigentlich beweifien
will, und solchs warlich ungehrn, dan lch zur solchen Streittschrifften gahr
unlustig, aber nothwendig, sowoll zur Rettung h meinerfama und guten geruchts,
alfJ zur beschirmung der warheitt, anders nit sein kan oder mag. II Damit auch
nebenzue und zugleich elucescieren und erscheinen soll uter nostrum in Math-
ematicis artibus (si forte non in Astronomicis mechanicis exercitijs) superior.
E: Khay: May: demnach Allerundertheniglichst bittendt, dieselbigen wegen
solcher meiner fUrhabenden gelimnfflichen und schimnfflichen Andtwurtt ein
Allergnedigst gefallen undt kein Ungefallen wolten tragen 13 oder haben, darin
geschicht die billigkeit, und geraichet Eur: Khay: May: nicht minder den mihr
zue sonderlichen ehren und rhumb, indem nemblich daj3 menniglich moge sehen
und spiiren, daj3 Eur: Khay: Mayes: nicht solche leutthe, wie mein Antagonista
vermeldet, in Dero selben Hofe oder dienste habe oder ufjhaltten. Etenim: Con-
scia mens recti famae mendacia ridet. Mit Allerunderthenigster empfehlung E:
Khay: May: in Godtlicher Allmacht Allergniidigisten schutz:
Eur Rom: Khas, Mayes:
Allerunderthenigster diener und Mathematicus
Nicolaus Raiinarus Ursus Dithmarsus.
92 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

REFERENCES
1. See the account of Ursus's arrival in Prague given by the Imperial Physician, Thaddeus Hayek, in
his letterto Tycho of 29 August 1591: TBOO, viii, 305.8-12.
2. On the world system presented in Fundamentum astronomicum, see Launert, Nicolaus Reimers,
155-207; M. A. Granada, Sfere solide e cielo fiuido: Momenti del dibattito cosmologico nella
seconda meta del Cinquecento (Naples, 2002), 263-78.
3. On the copying and manuscript circulation ofTycho's letters see A. Mosley, "Tycho Brahe's Epistolae
astronomicae: A reappraisal", in J. Papy, T. van Houdt, G. Toumoy and C. Matheeussen (eds),
Self-presentation and social identification: The rhetoric and pragmatics of letter writing in
early-modern times (Leuven, 2002),449-68.
4. TBOO, vi, 61.41-62.35; 179.2-180.11.
5. Epistolae astronomicae was published "with the privileges of the Emperor and certain Kings [CUM
CAESARIS ET REGUM QUORUNDAM PRlVILEGllSj": TBOO, vi, 3.
6. See B. Fabian (ed.), Die Messkataloge des Sechzehnten lahrhunderts: Faksimiledrucke. Band V. Die
Messkataloge Georg Willers. Fastenmesse 1593 bis Herbstmesse 1600 (Hildesheim, 2001).
7. Staatskanzlei, Wissenschaft und Kunst, K6, fol. 33. The Director of the archives, Dr Gottfried Mraz,
and his co-worker, Dr Elisabeth Springer, found this letter, which was classed in error under
"Kaimarus" rather than "Raimarus",
8. Cf, De astronomicis hypothesibus, Fi,r.12, where Ursus responds to the charge of plagiarism in
Rothmann's letterof21 February 1589: "Let it be a theft, but a philosophical one. Learn to look
after your property more carefully in future [Sitfurtum. sed Philosophicum: disce in posterum rem
tuam custodire]". Kepler took this, or affected to take it, as an admission of guilt: KGW, xiii, no.
123.244-5. However, the context makes it clear that Ursus was baiting Tycho, not confessing; and
he unambiguously denied the theft elsewhere in De astronomicis hypothesibus: Div,r.28-29.
9. Cf De astronomicis hypothesibus, Ciii,r.8-12; Dii,r.15-v.23.
10. Virgil, Aeneid, i, 604.
11. Not in Ursus's hand.
12. "Ursus" written in left-hand margin, not in Ursus's hand.
13. Underlining not by the same pen as the letter.

III: The production of Ursus's De astronomicis hypothesibus

(Prague, 1597)

DIETER LAUNERT and NICHOLAS JARDINE

In 1597, in his De astronomicis hypothesibus, Ursus responded to Epistolae astro-

nomicae of 1596 where Tycho Brahe had published correspondence in which he and
Christoph Rothmann applied insulting and disparaging expressions to Ursus and
accused him of having stolen from Tycho the new geoheliocentric world system. In
De astronomicis hypothesibus Ursus defended himself, and he repaid his adversaries
in their own coin, heaping comparable insults on Tycho Brahe and Rothmann.'
Although, as shown in the previous article, Ursus had sought Imperial approval
for his response to Epistolae astronomicae, De astronomicis hypothesibus was
published without a privilege. Further, the book does not specify any printer. Given
 Tycho v. Ursus 93

FIG. 1. Top of the title page ofUrsus, Chronotheatron (Prague, 1597), with ornamental frieze.

that it attacked in the most scurrilous terms a nobleman known to have supporters at
Court, Ursus may well not have been able to find a printer prepared to be named. As.
it turned out, anonymity was a wise precaution. For Tycho Brahe succeeded in having
the Emperor commission the Archbishop of Prague, Zbynka Berky z Dube (Zbigneus
Berka de Duba), to seek out all copies for burning and to punish the printer.'
Who was the printer? And what is the significance of Ursus's extraordinary dec-
laration on the title page: "In Prague of the Bohemians at the house of the author:
without any privilege [PRAGAE BOHEMORUMAPUDAUTOREM: ABSQUE OMNI
PRIVILEGIO]"? Launert has speculated on the identity of the printer. A handwritten
dedication by Ursus to the publisher Levinus Hulsius led to the conjecture that it
was he who might have printed Ursus's work.' But this supposition was very prob-
ably mistaken. The printer was almost certainly Wenzeslaus Marin of Prague. On
the title page (Figure 1) and elsewhere in Ursus's Chronotheatron of 1597 are to
be found ornamental friezes of precisely the same kind as that on the second page
(Figure 2) of De astronomicis hypothesibus above the epigrammatic poem of Johan-
nes Trunccius.'
The Chronotheatron came from the house of Wenzeslaus Marin, as shown by the
colophon on the final page: "At Prague from the press ofWenzeslaus Marin of Jen-
cice, with the privilege of the Emperor for fifteen years. In the year 1597 [PRAGAE
BOHEMORUM TYPI S WENCESLAI MARINI a GENCZICZ, CUM PRIVILEGIO
CAESARIS AD ANNOS QUINDECIM. ANNO MDXCVIl]." The house of Marin was
recently formed, In 1588 Michael Peterle had taken over the printing house of his
father, also called Michael, on the Mala Strana of Prague. After his death, his widow,

..•• . .
(
~
~~
\~~~ ~ ~~
EEIGRAMMA 'IN ARCTOMASTIGES
Ioannis Trunccij Boruffi. ' .
FIG. 2. Top of page Ai,v of Ursus, De astronomicis hypothesibus (Prague, 1597), with ornamental
frieze.
94 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

Lidmila von Zavorice, remarried in 1596 Vaclav (= Wenzeslaus) Marin of Jencice

(close to Lovosice, 50km NW of Prague), who in turn died shortly after. So Wen-
zeslaus Marin owned a printing house at Prague for only a short time; before that he
had been in the service of the Emperor as a forester at Burg Kfivoklat (Purglitz).'
In this period, woodblocks were on occasion loaned or passed on from printing
house to printing house." So in itself the identity of the friezes does not conclusively
demonstrate that De astronomicis hypothesibus was produced by Marin's printing
house rather than one of the dozen or so other Prague print shops.' However, the
fact that we are here dealing with books by the same author produced in the same
year strengthens the case.
A further similarity between the two works concerns their distribution. Informa-
tion about the production of the Chronotheatron may be gleaned from the collection
of sixteen poetic couplets at the beginning of the work. The relevant ones read as
follows.
It is on sale at Prague at the author's house [PRAGAE apud Autorem prostat];
but as a gift [in Honorem] to him who estimates its value not by pages but by its
contribution to knowledge.
Printed at the end of this century by the metal [aere] of Marin: with the grace of
the Emperor granted for fifteen years.
So the Chronotheatron was available "at the author's house [apud Autorem]"; and
this is surely the meaning of "apud autorem" on the title page of De astronomicis
hypothesibus. Likewise the Chronotheatron was given without charge by Ursus to
the discerning customer. So too was De astronomicis hypothesibus. When Georg
Rollenhagen sent a copy of De astronomicis hypothesibus to Tycho, he noted in
the accompanying letter how he had been told of the work by the jeweller Caspar
Lehmann, who reported that it was "privately given to some"." That the stock of De
astronomicis hypothesibus was indeed held at Ursus's house is confirmed by the
Hofkammer decision, dated 20 October 1600, to award 300 florins compensation to
Ursus's widow for the books confiscated following the condemnation of the work."
As for Ursus's provocative declaration, "In Prague at the house of the author,
without any privilege", this is in keeping with the tenor of the work as a whole.
Throughout De astronomicis hypothesibus Ursus jeers at Tycho's self-presentation
in Epistolae astronomicae, typified by the inclusion of a poem addressed to him-
self as "the Prince of the astronomers of this century".'? Such grandiose but empty
posturings Ursus sets alongside his own honest claims to mathematical expertise.
Now the title page of Epistolae astronomicae announces: "At Uraniburg with the
privileges of the Emperor and certain Kings [URANIBURGI CUM CAESARIS ET
REGUM QUORUNDAM PRIVILEGIIS]". In boasting of his lack of privilege, an act
of bravado for which we know of no parallel in the period, Ursus is surely mocking
Tycho's magnificent declaration.
 Tycho v. Ursus 95

REFERENCES
I. On Tycho's counterattack in De astronomicis hypothesibus see Jardine, Kepler's A defence of Tycho,
chap. 2; and Launert, Nicolaus Reimers, 285-320.
2. Letter of Tycho Brahe to Kepler, 28 August 1600: TBOO, viii, 344.1-4; KGW, xiv, no. 173.148-
151.
3. The inscription reads "D. Levino Hulsio arnico singulari devotiss[imusl Autor". The copy is now at
the Forschungs- und Landesbibliothek, Gotha. See Launert, Nicolaus Reimers, 286-8.
4. Launert, Nicolaus Reimers, 267.
5. See J. Volf, Geschichte des Buchdrucks in Bohmen und Miihren bis 1848 (Weimar, 1928),71 and
82-83.
6. On the circulation of woodblocks among Prague printers of the period see M. Bohatkova, "Book-
printing and other forms of publishing in Prague, 1550-1650", in E. Fucikova et al. (eds), Rudolf
and Prague: The court and the city (London, 1997),332-9.
7. On the Prague printing houses see ibid., and Volf, Geschichte des Buchdrucks (ref. 5), 28-96. Volf
lists a dozen printing houses active in 1597, and Bohatkova estimates that there were twenty-eight
printing houses in the period 1550-1650.
8. TBOO, viii, 50.32-37.
9. See M. List and V.Bialas, "Die Coss von Jost Biirgiin der Redaktion von Johannes Kepler", Abhandlungen
der Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften: Mathematisch-naturwissenschaftliche Klasse, n.s.,
cliv (1973), 5-128, pp. 108-9.
10. TBOO, iv, 6.19-21; mocked by Ursus, De astronomicis hypothesibus, B2,r.3ff.

IV: Astro-humour: The riddle of the date of Ursus's

De astronomicis hypothesibus

DIETER LAUNERT

For a breeze of morning moves,

And the planet of Love is on high,
Beginning to faint in the light that she loves
On a bed of daffodil sky,
To faint in the light of the sun she loves,
To faint in his light, and to die.
(Tennyson, Maud: A monodrama)

After the title page ofUrsus's De astronomicis hypothesibus comes an epigrammatic

poem by Johannes Trunccius of Prussia.' There follows the seven-page dedicatory
letter to Moritz, Landgraf of Hessen-Kassel, The letter ends with an indication of a
date in the following form: "d 0 9, utroque cl'1 ingrediente Anno Epochae Christianae
usitatae 1597".2 Ursus here poses a riddle for us; or is it rather for Tycho Brahe and
Christoph Rothmann?
In a work such as De astronomicis hypothesibus one expects irony and mockery,
but perhaps not humour. What is the date that Ursus thus indicates? The year 1597 is
immediately recognizable. The remaining indication "d 0 9, utroque cl'(, ingrediente"
contains the symbols:
96 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

o = superior conjunction, that is, a conjunction of the Sun with an inferior

planet when the planet is on the far side of the Sun (not to be confused with
d = Mars or Tuesday);
o = Sun (or Sunday);
9 = Venus (or Friday);
t1 = Leo (or ascending node).
So "00 9" evidently denotes the conjunction of the Sun and Venus, since invocations
of Sunday and Friday make no sense in connection with the superior conjunction.
There follows "utroque t1 ingrediente", that is, "both enter Leo". Now this cannot
refer to the ascendant node of Venus, for in the year 1597 that was reached on 23
June and not even approximately on the day on which the Sun enters Leo, that is on
the 23 July (with an ecliptic longitude of 1200E). So t'/, surely indicates the zodiacal
sign Leo and not the constellation, for the limits of constellations were still not well
enough defined at the time.
When one simulates on the computer the positions of the planets in June and
July 1597, Venus is at first a morning star; around 23 July her image on the screen
merges into that of the Sun; on the 23 July she overtakes the Sun - it is the superior
conjunction. Then Venus is found to the east of the Sun and she becomes an evening
star. This all happens under the signs of Cancer and Leo, where the Sun is situated
at the time. That the Sun, as in every year, should enter the house of Leo on 23 July
can have no special significance. That Venus should have her superior conjunction
with the Sun and so enter Leo together with him - it was this that provided Ursus
with the opportunity to display his astronomical expertise in giving this lighthearted
indication of the date.'

REFERENCES
I. For mentions of Johannes Trunccius, see Nicolaus Taurellus, Emblemata physico-ethica (Niirnberg,
1602),44,90.
2. De astronomicis hypothesibus, Bi,r.24-25.
3. I thank Professor Dr Arno Oberschelp of Kiel, who provided me with the crucial clue for this
solution.
 Tycho v. Ursus 97

V: The lost copy of Ursus's De astronomicis hypothesibus marked for use

in his trial

NICHOLAS JARDINE and KARIN TYBJERG

In September 1598 Tycho was staying at Wandsburg Castle, lent to him by the Royal
Governor of Schleswig-Holstein, Heinrich Rantzau. He wrote bad-temperedly to his
young kinsman Holger Rosenkrantz in Denmark, who had recently been affianced to
his niece Sophie.' The principal ground for Tycho's annoyance was Rosenkrantz's
failure to present Tycho's just-published Astronomiae instauratae mechanica and his
recently prepared manuscript star catalogue to the Danish king, Christian IV. It was a
further source of irritation that Tycho had not recovered the copy lent to Rosenkrantz
of Ursus's defamatory De astronomicis hypothesibus?
I have not received that scurrilous book, which you say you have sent back. See
to it that I get it soon. For with the permission of the Emperor I have decided to
have that infamous writer dealt with by law; nor is there another copy at hand
from which I can obtain the main points of the charges. Nor if there were, is
there time to go through it again or have marginal indications [annotationes
marginates] added, as was done there.
From December 1598 to June 1599 Tycho was at Wittenberg, waiting to move on to
Prague to enter the service of Emperor Rudolf II once the city was clear of the plague.
Shortly after his arrival in Wittenberg he wrote briefly, and more good-naturedly, to
Rosenkrantz, enclosing a copy of his letter to a mutual friend, Niels (Nicolaus) Krag,
giving a full account of his plans to move to Prague. In a postscript he returned to
the topic of Ursus and the missing book.
Despite the fact that in your last letter, which I received when I was at Wandsburg,
you say that you have sent it to me, I have not received that writing of the man
from Dithmarschen, vile and abounding in calumnies, that I sent for you to look
at. See to it then that I have it soon, for I cannot be without it, because of the
things which were inscribed in the margin so that I could provide the opportunity
for someone else to throw these abusive words back at their author; but he will
soon suffer his just deserts. 3
From these letters it is far from clear how Tycho intended to use the copy of Ursus's
book with the annotationes marginates in his pursuit oflegal sanction against Ursus,
A possible clue is to be found in the involvement in Tycho's preparation for a trial
of another of his relatives, a fellow exile from Denmark, the nobly born alchemist
and debtor Eric Lange, fianbe-ofTycho's long-suffering sister Sophie." It was in the
retinue of Lange that Ursus had visited Tycho on Hven in 1584, and had, so Tycho
maintained, stolen Tycho's hypotheses by furtively copying from a diagram. In early
October 1598 Tycho had spent a week at Magdeburg. There, as he reported a couple
of years later to Anders Vedel (Velleius), Historian to Christian IV, he had persuaded
98 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

Lange to testify on his behalf. After grumbling that the whole affair was Lange's fault
for inviting Ursus to Tycho's island without asking him, Tycho continued:
[Lange] was for that reason compelled to testify before a public notary at Magde-
burg about what he knew to be the truth against that infamous book, though he
did this reluctantly; and everything was set out in public instruments, as they
are called, of parchment, written partly in German, partly in Latin, so that I
would have to hand the means to convict him at Prague, when it pleased me to
lay a charge, not indeed myself, for I hold him unworthy, but through another,
an attorney engaged at my expense. This I had already decided to do even if I
had not come to Prague; for it concerns my honour and reputation, which ought
to be defended.'
The nature of these legal instruments is more fully spelled out in a postscript to
Tycho's letter to Kepler of 9 December 1599. 6 In February of that year Kepler had
written to Tycho, at the instigation of his former teacher, Michael Maestlin, apolo-
gising for the obsequious and adulatory letter, containing the words "I esteem your
hypotheses [hypotheses tuas amo]", that he had written to Ursus in November 1595,
and which Ursus had included in De astronomicis hypothesibus.' After formally
forgiving Kepler and declaring Ursus unworthy of many words, Tycho proceeded
to denounce him at considerable length, informing Kepler of his determination to
bring Ursus to trial. With the letter Tycho sent a copy of the testimonial of Lange's
secretary, Michael Walther, concerning Ursus's suspicious behaviour during his visit
to Hven in 1584. 81'ycho told how this testimonial had been formally confirmed by
Lange at Magdeburg, and how Lange had provided further testimony on Ursus's
book for use in the trial.
I have added also the testimonial of the secretary of that most noble man Eric
Lange, who was then served by Ursus, who was in attendance when he was
with me accompanying his master. Eric himself later confirmed this testimony
at Magdeburg in the presence of a public notary; and he testified that whatever
else Ursus maintains in that infamous writing, insofar as he knew something
definite about the matter, is entirely false; and there has been drawn up a public
instrument, as it is called, concerning twelve points [puncta] of this sort excerpted
from that infamous book, which were brought to his attention. This you will see
on another occasion."
From this we may infer that the legal instruments mentioned in Tycho's letter to
Vedel included the affidavited testimony of Walther confirmed by Lange, as well as
Lange's own notarized testimony concerning the twelve points in De astronomicis
hypothesibus. So the question naturally arises, did those-twelve points correspond to
the passages picked out in the copy that 1'ycho had lent to Rosenkrantz?
Holger Rosenkrantz's library was put up for auction on the death of his grand-
son Jens Rosenkrantz in 1695, and the Royal Library at Copenhagen purchased
books at this auction.'? Inspection of the extant copy in the Royal Library revealed
 Tycho v. Ursus 99

no significant markings or annotations suggesting ownership by either Tycho or

Rosenkrantz. However, in 1918-26 scientific and medical books were transferred
from the Royal Library to the University Library, and in 1986 an independent Danish
National Library of Science and Medicine was formed. I I So the copy of De astro-
nomicis hypothesibus now to be found in the Danish National Library of Science
and Medicine (4E Astr. 8050) may well formerly have been in the Royal Library.
Examination of this second copy proved more rewarding. Its title-page (Figure 1) is

FIG. 1. Title page of the copy of Nicolaus Raimarus Ursus's De astronomicis hypothesibus (Prague,
1597) in the Danish National Library ofScience and' Medicine (4° Astr. 8050). By kind permis-
sion of the Library.
100 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

inscri bed "Gift of the author [Donum Autoris]". There is underlining of Dii,r.15, "He
applauds himself with his rattling stork's bill [Ipsa sibi plaudat crepitante Ciconia
rostro]";12 and there is a marginal "n,' against a passage in Cii.r in which Ursus wishes
that the ancient medicine and music could be restored, just as he is later on in the
work going to restore the ancient astronomy. In addition, there are scattered small
marginal markings, thus: "-". Sixteen ofthese marks are quite clear, and are closely
similar in ink and formation. 13 Two are less clear, and could possibly be blotches of
printer's ink or discoloured flecks in the paper,"
All the marginal marks are against passages insulting to Tycho, all but two of them
being in Ursus's letter of dedication to Moritz, Landgraf of Hesse-Kassel" or in the
immediately following invective poem "Against the new grammar of my critics [In
novam grammaticam meorum zoilorumi"," The following sample of the marked
passages is chosen to cover the main types of insult.
Truly in this preposterous accusation, and false and unjust charge!' - not to
say criminal outburst - in these, I say, that vengefulness of his betrays his
impudence as well as his imprudence and lack of experience, his most crass
ignorance and worthlessness; or rather, by its most petulant spirit and reckless
action, exertion and effort, it advertises and exhibits his excessive, nay rash and
execrable, insolence."
[One mark against this passage]
Carefully, carefully, beware, you Danish man, make haste slowly,'? and don't
stray far from your lair," and be assured that beyond the straits of the Baltic
and Kattegat [trans Baltheum sinumve Codanumi" other men live and survive
to this day, nor are all wisdom and science imparted to Denmark alone, to your
Danish brain through the distended and more than properly large holes of your
amputated nose, by divine and heavenly influence, and by the stars or by the
frequent observation of them. Nor is it true, as you said to me in Danish at
Uraniburg in the year 1584, on St Michael's Day in the morning before lunch in
the presence of the noble Dane Eric Lange, that "those German fellows are all
half-cracked [Den Tyske karle er allsammel all gall]".22 (Forgive me, my dear
Tycho, if I am by no means skilled in the orthography of the Danish language;
but I don't greatly care, for you will readily understand the thought.) But that
boundlessly insolent Danish pride and presumption despatches and dismisses
all other nations, especially Germans and ScotS.23
[Three marks against this passage, see Figure 2]
And besides, given that my adversary himself, Tycho, addressed and dedicated to
Your Highness" that monstrous and worthless chao~ofhisAstronomicalletters,
in which as much falsely as ignorantly he charges me with such a theft and secret
filching, and where both he and Sniveller [Rotzmannus]25 vehemently persecute
and revile me with their taunts, .their jibes, their insults and their jests in the
manner of buffoons and old.fools, to whom should I rather submit and seek fair
 Tycho v. Ursus 101

FIG. 2. Marginal marking of passages insulting to Tycho in Ursus's letter of dedication to Landgraf Moritz
of Hesse-Kassel, De astronomicis hypothesibus, Aiv,v. By kind permission of the Danish National
Library of Science and Medicine.

judgement for so great an injustice committed against me?"

[One mark against this passage]
As you are as a grammarian, so too you are in the poetic art: wretched in the
poetic art and a bad grammarian."
[One mark against this passage, see Figure 3]
And unless this old and envious one stops reviling [me], I shall make sure he
appears as an old lady [anus] or ignoramus [anous]. I shall also make sure (believe
me) that people see that Tycho's grammar is on a par with his mathematics;
and I shall see to it that they realize that he didnot learn mathematics, though
102 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

FIG. 3. Marginal marking of passages insulting to Tycho in Ursus's poem "In novam grarnmaticam meorum
zoilorum", De astronomicis hypothesibus, Bii,v. By kind permission of the Danish National Library
of Science and Medicine.

mechanically he may be the greatest astronomer. But what sort of astronomer?

He lacks the two arts which great Plato calls the wings of astronomy."
[Two marks against this passage]
He will be an Astronomer, indeed the Prince of Astronomers, as Tycho pre-
sumptuously boasts himself to be in the .art:29 He is nothing but a Mechanic, for
he knows not true mathematics, or if-he does know something, that something
is nothing." .'
[One mark against this passage]
 Tycho v. Ursus 103

Identification of this as the copy prepared for use in Tycho's suit against Ursus faces
some apparently awkward questions. Can such marks be considered as annotationes?
If the marks indicate the twelve puncta about which Lange testified, why are there at
least sixteen, perhaps seventeen or eighteen, of them? If this is the copy Tycho lent
to Rosenkrantz, why should it be inscribed "gift of the author"? And how could Eric
Lange, an undischarged bankrupt and exile, have been considered by Tycho to be a
competent and effective witness to the falsity of Ursus's denigrations?
The first question is readily answered. Annotatio is to some extent a "false friend".
It can mean "annotation" in our customary sense; but it has a wide range of other con-
notations, including "notice", "attention", "report", and significantly for the present
case, "indication" and "mark". As for the number of the puncta on which Lange
testified, it should be noted that the longer insulting passages carry more than one
mark. If the passages rather than the marks are counted, the two dubiously marked
ones being set aside, the number comes to twelve. Alternatively, it may well be that
the "duodecim" here means, as often in the period, "a dozen" in the sense of "lots
of" - as in "If I've told you once, I've told you a dozen times".
The inscription "Donum Autoris" on the title page is, in fact, fully consistent with
the likely origin of the copy lent to Rosenkrantz. In September 1598, as is clear from
his letter to Rosenkrantz, Tycho had to hand no copy of Ursus's De astronomicis
hypothesibus. However, he had earlier been sent at least three copies. The first came
from a student at Helmstedt, but Tycho subsequently mislaid it," Then he received a
copy from Georg Rollenhagen." Yet another copy, sent by Hayek, was probably lost
in transit. 33 In the letter accompanying the book Rollenhagen relates how a friend at
Court, the jeweller Caspar Lehmann, had told him that Ursus "rails at you in shameful
ways in a pamphlet privately given to some". 34 He asked Lehmann to send him a copy,
which he lost, and then a second copy, the one he gave to Tycho." Lehmann is likely
to have obtained the book "given to some" directly from Ursus, so the inscription
(which is not in the hand of Ursus or of Rollenhagen) may well be his.
With regard to Lange's competence to testify to Tycho's character and abilities, it
is important to consider what Tycho is likely to have wanted of a witness. As is well
known, in this period the rank of a witness was crucial in determining the weight of
his testimony." Further, Tycho needed someone who would be seen to be familiar
with his character and his astronomical activities. Lange fitted the bill. He was of
high nobility equal to Tycho's, he belonged to Tycho's extended/amilia, and he was
a learned man - Edward Rosen has described him as "a Danish nobleman with an
atypical passion for matters ofthe mind"."
It is, however, the nature of the passages marked that speaks most strongly in
favour of this as the copy prepared for Lange and lent to Rosenkrantz. Tycho's
aim in taking legal action against Ur~us was, as he informed Vedel and Kepler in
the letters cited above, to protect his honour and reputation. In De astronomicis
hypothesibus Ursus attacked Tycho on many fronts. He mocked the arrogance Tycho
had displayed in publishing in Epistolae astronomicae poems and descriptions of
104 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

Uraniburg most flattering to himself (as in the last of the extracts quoted above).
He sneered at Tycho's disfigured nose (as in the second extract). He accused Tycho
of inhospitable conduct towards guests in the presence of Lange (as in the second
extract). He charged Tycho with envy and injustice in accusing Ursus of plagiarism
(as in the first extract). He responded in the most insulting terms to the specific
allegations in Epistolae astronomicae concerning his suspicious behaviour while
visiting Hven." He cast grave aspersions on the morals of the mother of Tycho's
children." And throughout the work Ursus doled out insulting epithets, "insolent",
"execrable", "ignoble", "criminal", "crass", etc. (as in all the extracts cited above).
As for Tycho's competence, his literacy was called in question in the invective poem
"On the new grammar of my critics" (as in the final extract); and he was repeatedly
said to lack the mathematical abilities needed for mastery of astronomy (as in the
last two extracts cited above). On top of all this, Tycho was challenged on specific
astronomical and mathematical issues. In particular, his claim about the originality
of his geo-heliocentric hypotheses was denied on the grounds that they were to be
found in Copernicus and had been known in Antiquity to Apollonius of Perga and
Martianus Capella;" and doubt was cast on his technical mathematical expertise by
calling on him to answer a series of questions relating to prosthaphaeresis (that is,
to formulae for carrying out trigonometrical calculations using only addition and
subtraction) and its astronomical applications."
The issues relating to Ursus's behaviour on Hven were the subject of a separate
legal instrument, Lange's confirmation of the testimony of his secretary, Michael
Walther. And as for the defamation of his private life, Tycho would hardly have
wanted to air the issue ofthe status of his marriage and the morals of his wife. On the
specific astronomical and mathematical issues he could not hope for knowledgeable
support from Lange. In contrast, samples of the insults relating to Tycho's character,
literacy and standing as an astronomer, precisely the issues on which Lange could
convincingly testify, are marked. Most significantly of all, the alleged abuse by
Tycho of his German guests in Lange's presence, the only passage in De astronomi-
cis hypothesibus in which Lange figures, is likewise marked. We conclude that this
is indeed the errant copy of Ursus's De astronomicis hypothesibus that Tycho had
intended for use in Ursus's trial.

REFERENCES
I. On Holger Rosenkrantz and his dealings with Tycho, see V. E. Thoren, The Lord of Uraniborg: A
biography ofTycho Brahe (Cambridge, 1990),387-8, 4()()'-2; and J. B. Christianson, On Tycho's
island: Tycho Brahe and his assistants. 1570-1601 (Cambridge, 2000), 344-6.
2. TBOO, viii, 112.27-32. We thank Adam Mosley for bringingto our attention this passage and its
possible significance: see Mosley, Bearing the heavens, 173, n.333.
3. TBOO, viii, 126.21-26.
4. On Eric Lange and his dealings with Tycho and Tycho's sister, see Christianson, On Tycho's island
(ref. I), chaps. 5-9 and pp. 258~.
5. Tycho to Vedel, 18 September 1599, TBOO, viii, 180.40-181.7.
 Tycho v. Ursus 105

6. TBOO, viii, 210.7-211.7; KGW, xiv, no. 145.264-299.

7. TBOO, viii, 141-4.
8. KOO, i, 230.55-231.56. Walther's affidavit is to be found in vol. v, 302r-303v, of the Kepler papers
at the Academy of Sciences, St Petersburg.
9. TBOO, viii, 210.35-42; KGW, xiv, no. 145.291-298.
10. K. F. Plesner, Beger og bogsamlere (Copenhagen, 1962), 71.
II. See H. Horstbell, The Royal Library over 350 years, ed. by L. 0mann, transl. by V. Cranfield
(Copenhagen, 1997). Our thanks to Adam Mosley and Torsten Schlichtkrul1, Head of the
Department of Conservation at the Danish National Library of Science and Medicine, for
information about these matters.
12. Cf Ovid, Metamorphoses, vi, 97.
13. The marks are placed as fol1ows: Aiv,r.23; Aiv,r.39/40; Aiv,v.7,1O/11,14; Aiv,v.24,2617; Bi,r.8/9;
Bii,r.28; Bii,v.\ I; Bii,v.23,27; Biii,r.20; Biii,v.l; Biv,r.ll; Div,r.\6.
14. A,r.35; Fiii,v.34.
15. Aii.r-Bi.r,
16. Bi,v-Biv,r. The reference is to the grammar of Tycho's and Rothrnann's letters in Epistolae
astronomicae. As for Zoilus, "He was a sophist of Amphipolis in the time of Ptolemy, famous
for this one outrage, that he dared to find fault with Homer, prince of poets, in books written
against him": Carolus Stephanus, Dictionarium historicum, geographicum, poeticum (Paris,
1596),451 v, col. 2.
17. The reference is to a passage in Tycho's letter to Rothmann of 21 February 1589 in Epistolae
astronomicae, in which Tycho had charged Ursus with plagiarism, and specifically with having
copied a defective diagram of his hypotheses whilst visiting Hven in the service of Eric Lange
in 1584: TBOO, vi, 179.20-180.5.
18. Aiv,r.22-27.
19. Cf Erasmus, Adagia, ii, I, I.
20. Cf Terence, Phormio, v, 2, 3.
21. In maps of the period Kattegat is cal1ed "sinus Codanus" or "Codanisch Meerbusen",
22. This interpretation fol1ows J. L. E. Dreyer, Tycho Brahe (Edinburgh, 1890),274.
23. Aiv,v.4-15. Germans criticized by Tycho in Epistolae astronomicae included Rothmann, Paul Wittich
(see, for example, TBOO, vi, 141.42-142.5) and Ursus himself. In his letter to Rothmann of
14 January 1595 Tycho had violently denounced, without naming, a certain "Scotus" (John
Craig), who had criticised his views on comets (TBOO, vi, 315-37): on this attack on Craig see
A. Mosley, "Tycho Brahe and John Craig: The dynamic of a dispute", in J. R. Christianson, A.
Hadravova, P. Hadrava and M. Sole (eds), Tycho Brahe and Prague: Crossroads of European
science (Frankfurt, 2002), 70-83.
24. That is, Moritz, Landgraf of Hesse-Kassel, to whom Tycho had dedicated his Epistolae astronomicae,
and to whom Ursus here dedicates De astronomicis hypothesibus.
25. Here, as throughout the work, Ursus cal1s Rothmann, "Rotzrnannus", "Rotz" meaning "snot",
26. Bi,r.7-12.
27. Bii,v.II-12. Tycho's sensitivity on the issue of the informality of the letters in Epistolae astronomicae
is evident from his defence in the preface of their extemporaneous nature and their plain and
simple style appropriate to "mathematical truths": TBOO, vi, 23.6-34 and 28.6-9.
28. Bii,v.23-30. Geometry and arithmetic were commonly described in the early-modem period as the
two wings of astronomy, Plato often being cited as the source. The image is not to be found in
Plato or elsewhere in ancient literature. However, in Republic, vii, and more explicitly in Laws,
817, and Epinomis (then attributed to Plato), 990, geometry and arithmetic are presented as
prerequisites for the study of astronomy; and Phaedrus, 246, tel1s of the wings of the soul, lost
at birth, that can be recovered by the true philosopher, enabling him to ascend to the Divine.
Dr Sachiko Kusukawa has identified a probable source of the image in Melanchthon's In
arithmeticen praefatio Georgii loachimi Rhetici (1536), in which arithmetic and geometry are
106 Nicholas Jardine and colleagues

identified as the Platonic wings of the soul and as prerequisites for the study of celestial matters.
See G. Bretschneider, Philippi Melanthonis opera quae supersunt omnia (Halle, 1843), xi, col.
282.41-43; and col. 288.4-8 and 26-31.
29. One of the adulatory poems with which Epistolae astronomicae opens is headed "To the most noble
man, Tycho Brahe, Prince of the astronomers of our age": TBOO, vi, 6.19-21.
30. Biv,r.9-12.
31. Tycho to Kepler, I April 1598, TBOO, viii, 46.37-40; Tycho to Hayek, 1598, TBOO viii, 56.12-
13.
32. Rollenhagen to Tycho, April 1598, TBOO, viii, 50.36-51.6.
33. Tycho to Hayek, 1598, TBOO, viii, 56.5-12.
34. TBOO, viii, 50.32-37.
35. TBOO, viii, 50.27-51.6. The source of the copy lent by Tycho to Rosenkrantz was noted by Mosley,
Bearing the heavens, 173.
36. See, for example, B. J. Shapiro, A culture offact (Ithaca, NY, 2000), chap. 1; and S. Shapin, A social
history oftruth (Chicago, 1994), chap. I.
37. Rosen, Three Imperial Mathematicians, 12. For more nuanced accounts of education and learning
among the Danish nobility of the period see B. Andersen, Adelig opfostring: Adelsborns
opdragelse i Danmark 1536-1660 (Copenhagen, 1971); L. Jespersen, "Court and nobility
in early-modern Denmark", Scandinavian journal of history, xxvii (2002), 129-42; and J. R.
Christianson, "Tycho and Sophie Brahe: Gender and science in the late sixteenth century", in
Christianson et al. (eds), Tycho Brahe (ref. 23), 30-45.
38. Eiv,r-Fii,v.
39. Fii,r: 12-20. The mother ofTycho's children, Kirsten Jergensdatter, not being of noble blood, was his
common-law wife. See Thoren, The Lord of Uraniborg (ref. 1),45-48.
40. Aiv,r:27-32; Ciiir:3-12; Dii,r:15-Dii,v:23.
41. Biii,v-Bivr; H3,r-KI,r. On the sixteenth-century development of prosthaphaeretic methods, see A.
von Braunmiihl, "Zur Geschichte der prosthaphaeretischen Methode in der Trigonometrie",
Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der Mathematik, ix (1899), 17-29, and V.Thoren, "Prosthaphaeresis
revisited", Historia mathematica, xv (1988), 32-39; on their astronomical applications, see J. L.
E. Dreyer, "On Tycho Brahe's manual of trigonometry", Observatory, xxxix (1916),127-31.

Part 2 in this series of articles will appear in our May issue.