He was inspired by two contradictory pieces of information: Arthur Koestler's claim, in his book The Sleepwalkers, that nobody had read Copernicus's book when it was published and Gingerich's discovery, in Edinburgh, of a first edition richly annotated in the margins by the leading teacher of astronomy in Europe in the 1540s.
Though Copernicus would not live to hear of its extraordinary impact, his book, which first suggested that the Sun, not the Earth, was the center of the universe, is today recognized as one of the most influential scientific works of all time-thanks in part to astrophysicist Owen Gingerich.įour and a half centuries after its initial publication, Gingerich embarked on an epic quest to see in person all extant copies of the first and second editions of De revolutionibus.
In the spring of 1543 as the celebrated astronomer, Nicolaus Copernicus, lay on his death bed, his fellow clerics brought him a long-awaited package: the final printed pages of the book he had worked on for many years: De revolutionibus (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres).
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