Astronomical Renaissance Museum
We also have food.
Astronomers Exhibit
Our museum is now featuring a new exhibit on famous astronomers from the Renaissance period (16-17th century). this exhibit will be showing astronomers like Nicolaus Copernicus, Tycho Brahe, Johannes Kepler, and Galileo Galilei. We will walk you through their lives and more importantly what they did to improve the understanding of the universe.
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543)
Copernicus was a Polish man. He lived from 1473-1543. During his long life he spent a lot of time looking at the heavens. After studying the sky long enough he came to the idea that the earth is not the center of the universe but the sun is. He wrote a manuscript in 1514 titled Commentariolas. This manuscript stated that the sun was the center of the universe. Copernicus later published a book called De Revolutions in 1543, two months before his death. This book had the mathematics to his universe but, after he was dead a Lutheran author added a preface to the book stating that it was only a hypothesis.
Tycho Brahe (1546-1601)
Brahe was Danish nobleman. He was very interested in the sky, so much so that he built an observatory on his estate. After learning of Copernicus's theory he came to the decision that the planets do have an orbit but they revolve around the earth and so does the sun and moon. His calculations indicate that the stars are over 700 times farther away than Saturn is. This would mean our universe is much larger than expected but, he was unable to except this fact so he stayed with his idea of an earth centered universe.
Johannes kepler (1571-1630)
Kepler was an assistant to Tycho. His job for Tycho was to observe the planet mars. Unlike Tycho Johannes's view of the universe was a sun centered universe like Copernicus. After studying mars and other planets he decided that the planets orbit the sun in an ellipses shape and not a circular shape. He developed a model that would show these orbits and also made mathematical rules that govern the period and size of a planets orbit.
Galileo Galilei (1564-1642)
Galileo was an Italian astronomer. Galileo heard of telescopes being used and understood how to make them so he made one of his own. Galileo's telescope was much more powerful than others at the time. His telescope was able to see much more and farther than anyone else had at the time. With his telescope he was able to see the moons of Jupiter and he was able to see that they orbited Jupiter. He knew that these moons orbited Jupiter very similarly to the earths moon around earth. This lead him to believe that the sun is the center of the universe. Galileo wanted to share his findings and support Copernicus's view so, after Galileo's friend became pope he decided it was a good time to. Galileo wrote a dialogue that explained how the center of the universe was the sun and also that the moon created the tides. He later was punished by the church for believing Copernicus.