Caspar Peucer was a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 reformer

Protestant Reformation

The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led...

, physician

Physician

A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...

, and scholar.

Biography

Born in Bautzen

Bautzen

Bautzen is a hill-top town in eastern Saxony, Germany, and administrative centre of the eponymous district. It is located on the Spree River. As of 2008, its population is 41,161...

, Peucer studied mathematics

Mathematics

Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...

, astronomy

Astronomy

Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...

, and medicine

Medicine

Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....

 at the University of Wittenberg from 1540. In 1543, he became a lodger in the house of one of the most famous professors in Wittenberg

Wittenberg

Wittenberg, officially Lutherstadt Wittenberg, is a city in Germany in the Bundesland Saxony-Anhalt, on the river Elbe. It has a population of about 50,000....

, the theologian and humanist

Humanism

Humanism is an approach in study, philosophy, world view or practice that focuses on human values and concerns. In philosophy and social science, humanism is a perspective which affirms some notion of human nature, and is contrasted with anti-humanism....

 Philipp Melanchthon

Philipp Melanchthon

Philipp Melanchthon , born Philipp Schwartzerdt, was a German reformer, collaborator with Martin Luther, the first systematic theologian of the Protestant Reformation, intellectual leader of the Lutheran Reformation, and an influential designer of educational systems...

, whose daughter Magdalena he married in 1550. In 1554, he became professor of mathematics

Mathematics

Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...

 at the University of Wittenberg, and in 1560 professor of medicine, leading the Wittenberg faculty in that field. Until 1574, he also served several times as dean

Dean (education)

In academic administration, a dean is a person with significant authority over a specific academic unit, or over a specific area of concern, or both...

 and rector

Rector

The word rector has a number of different meanings; it is widely used to refer to an academic, religious or political administrator...

. In spite of his medical profession — in 1570, he became even personal physician to the Elector

Prince-elector

The Prince-electors of the Holy Roman Empire were the members of the electoral college of the Holy Roman Empire, having the function of electing the Roman king or, from the middle of the 16th century onwards, directly the Holy Roman Emperor.The heir-apparent to a prince-elector was known as an...

 of Saxony

Saxony

The Free State of Saxony is a landlocked state of Germany, contingent with Brandenburg, Saxony Anhalt, Thuringia, Bavaria, the Czech Republic and Poland. It is the tenth-largest German state in area, with of Germany's sixteen states....

 — he was, after the death of Melanchthon, one of the leading Protestants in Saxony.

In 1574 Peucer was officially charged with Crypto-Calvinism

Crypto-Calvinism

Crypto-Calvinism is a term for Calvinist influence in the Lutheran Church during the decades just after the death of Martin Luther . It denotes what was seen as a hidden...

 in an inter-Lutheran fight for power and put in jail in the famed Königstein Fortress

Königstein Fortress

Königstein Fortress , the "Saxon Bastille", is a hilltop fortress near Dresden, in Saxon Switzerland, Germany, above the town of Königstein on the left bank of the River Elbe...

 for twelve years. Released in 1586, he went to the Duchy

Duchy

A duchy is a territory, fief, or domain ruled by a duke or duchess.Some duchies were sovereign in areas that would become unified realms only during the Modern era . In contrast, others were subordinate districts of those kingdoms that unified either partially or completely during the Medieval era...

 of Anhalt

Anhalt

Anhalt was a sovereign county in Germany, located between the Harz Mountains and the river Elbe in Middle Germany. It now forms part of the state of Saxony-Anhalt.- Dukes of Anhalt :...

, where he became Councillor

Councillor

A councillor or councilor is a member of a local government council, such as a city council.Often in the United States, the title is councilman or councilwoman.-United Kingdom:...

 and personal physician to the Prince of Anhalt.

He died in the capital of Dessau

Dessau

Dessau is a town in Germany on the junction of the rivers Mulde and Elbe, in the Bundesland of Saxony-Anhalt. Since 1 July 2007, it is part of the merged town Dessau-Roßlau. Population of Dessau proper: 77,973 .-Geography:...

in 1602.

Works (incomplete)

He wrote on astronomy, geometry, and medicine, and edited some of Melanchthon's letters (1565 and 1570):

• Tractatus historicus de Ph. Melanchthonis sententia de controversia coenae Domini, 1553 (printed 1596)
• Commentarius de praecipuis divinationum generibus, 1553
• Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum, 1560
• Opera Melan, 1562–65
• Epistolae, 1565
• Idyllion de Lusatia, 1583 (printed 1594)

Literature

• Caspar Peucer 1525–1602, Hans-Peter Hasse und Günther Wartenberg, ISBN 3374021069
• Zwischen Katheder, Thron und Kerker, Stadtmuseum Bautzen, Domowina Verlag, ISBN 3-7420-1925-2
• Wolfgang Klose, Das Wittenberger Gelehrtenstammbuch: das Stammbuch von Abraham Ulrich (1549–1577) und David Ulrich (1580–1623), Halle: Mitteldt. Verl., 1999, ISBN 3-932776-76-3
• Claudia Brosseder, Im Bann der Sterne: Caspar Peucer, Philipp Melanchthon und andere http://books.google.com/books?id=CGxc-ouDQGIC&pg=PA65&lpg=PA65&dq=gingerich+erasmus&source=web&ots=rbV5KyiOm2&sig=IA-yU8j1fnYlJgL7a-WNCNl9aVs#PPA22,M1
• Henke, Kaspar Peucer und Nikolaus Crell (Marburg, 1865)

External links