On this day in 1546: Tycho Brahe

1546 Tycho Brahe (d. October 24, 1601), Danish astronomer and almanackist.

King Frederick II of Denmark and Norway, impressed with Tycho's 1572 observations, financed the construction of two observatories for Tycho on Ven – Uraniborg and Stjerneborg. Brahe's data provided the basis for the work of Johannes Kepler (1571 - 1630). The appearance in 1572 of a "new star" (in fact a supernova) prompted Tycho's first publication, De nova stella. He appears to have accepted astrological prognostications on the principle that the heavenly bodies influenced (yet did not determine) terrestrial events. He was interested in alchemy, particularly the medical alchemy associated with Paracelsus (1493 - 1541). Brahe was also something of a poet ...