DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.52695#0013
INTRODUCTION
The celestial globe1 bequeathed by Martin Bylica to the Uni-
versity of Cracow, where he had once been a student and later
a lecturer, is still little known in spite of its fame and although it
has been studied and described by two scholars, both historians
of astronomy, Ludwik Antoni Birkenmajer and Ernest Zinner2.
The will of Martin Bylica, who died in 1493, leaving this treasure
to the University, has been lost — unless, as is possible, it still
remains undiscovered in some Hungarian archive.
The globe is not even mentioned in the comprehensive and
exhaustive two-volume publication on terrestrial and celestial
globes of E. L. Stevenson3. This is all the more surprising since
1 I wish to express my most sincere gratitude to all whose kind aid has helped
in writing this study. In the first place I should like to thank Dr. T. Kleberg,
Director of The University Library at Upsala, who very generously loaned to me
in Cracow numerous valuable publications without which it would have been
impossible for me to have completed this study. I am also greatly indebted to
Dr. Gerhard Schmidt of the Institute of the History' of Art in Vienna for the
searches that he made on my behalf in the University Archives, in the National
Library, and together with Father N. Rieth in the Archives of the Dominican
Monastery in Vienna. I am very grateful to the Director of the National Library
in Vienna for permission to reproduce the celestial maps from the manuscript
No. 5415 and to Director Dr. Grdtsch in Dresden for the photograph of the Arabic
globe in the Science Museum. My very special gratitude is due to Mr. W. Gumula
for the photographs that he made of the globe with such consummate skill and
precision.
2 L. A. Birkenmajer, Marcin Bylica z Olkusza oraz narzqdzia astronomiczne,
ktdre zapisal TJniwersytetowi Jagiellonskiemu w r. 1493. Proceedings Pol. Ac. Sc.
and Let., Section of Math, and Science, Series II, No. 5, Cracow 1893, pp. 63—94.
E. Zinner, Leben und Wirken des Johannes Muller von Konigsberg genannt
Regiomontanus, Miinchen 1938, pp. 116—122.
E. Zinner, Deutsche und niederlaendische astronomische Instrwmente vom
XI—XVIII Jahrhundert, Miinchen 1956, pp. 168—171 and 292—297.
3 E. L. Stevenson, Terrestrial and Celestial Globes, their History and Con-
struction, New Haven 1921.
The celestial globe1 bequeathed by Martin Bylica to the Uni-
versity of Cracow, where he had once been a student and later
a lecturer, is still little known in spite of its fame and although it
has been studied and described by two scholars, both historians
of astronomy, Ludwik Antoni Birkenmajer and Ernest Zinner2.
The will of Martin Bylica, who died in 1493, leaving this treasure
to the University, has been lost — unless, as is possible, it still
remains undiscovered in some Hungarian archive.
The globe is not even mentioned in the comprehensive and
exhaustive two-volume publication on terrestrial and celestial
globes of E. L. Stevenson3. This is all the more surprising since
1 I wish to express my most sincere gratitude to all whose kind aid has helped
in writing this study. In the first place I should like to thank Dr. T. Kleberg,
Director of The University Library at Upsala, who very generously loaned to me
in Cracow numerous valuable publications without which it would have been
impossible for me to have completed this study. I am also greatly indebted to
Dr. Gerhard Schmidt of the Institute of the History' of Art in Vienna for the
searches that he made on my behalf in the University Archives, in the National
Library, and together with Father N. Rieth in the Archives of the Dominican
Monastery in Vienna. I am very grateful to the Director of the National Library
in Vienna for permission to reproduce the celestial maps from the manuscript
No. 5415 and to Director Dr. Grdtsch in Dresden for the photograph of the Arabic
globe in the Science Museum. My very special gratitude is due to Mr. W. Gumula
for the photographs that he made of the globe with such consummate skill and
precision.
2 L. A. Birkenmajer, Marcin Bylica z Olkusza oraz narzqdzia astronomiczne,
ktdre zapisal TJniwersytetowi Jagiellonskiemu w r. 1493. Proceedings Pol. Ac. Sc.
and Let., Section of Math, and Science, Series II, No. 5, Cracow 1893, pp. 63—94.
E. Zinner, Leben und Wirken des Johannes Muller von Konigsberg genannt
Regiomontanus, Miinchen 1938, pp. 116—122.
E. Zinner, Deutsche und niederlaendische astronomische Instrwmente vom
XI—XVIII Jahrhundert, Miinchen 1956, pp. 168—171 and 292—297.
3 E. L. Stevenson, Terrestrial and Celestial Globes, their History and Con-
struction, New Haven 1921.