NICOLAUS COPERNICUS
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543) - renowned astronomer. Born in Toruñ, and educated in the Universities of Cracow, Bologna, Padua where he read Medicine, and Ferrara where he earned a doctorate in Canon Law, Copernicus was the first in modern history to put forward a heliocentric theory of the Solar System. He first presented his discoveries in a preliminary draft entitled 'Commentariolus'in 1507, but did not publish a full version until the year of his death in the work 'De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium' (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres).He was also a physician, economist, translator, cartographer and deviser of a system for the reform of the Julian calendar, and a public administrator (a servant of the King of Poland and was involved in the defence of Olsztyn Castle against an attack by the Teutonic Knights).