John Bevis
Encyclopedia
John Bevis was an English doctor
and astronomer
. He is best known for discovering the Crab Nebula
in 1731.
Bevis has also observed an occultation
by Venus
of Mercury
on May 28, 1737, and observed and found a prediction rule for eclipses of Jupiter
's moons. From observations made with his telescope at Stoke Newington
, Middlesex
, he compiled a star catalogue (more of an atlas) entitled Uranographia Britannica around 1750.
In 1757 he was asked by the tobacconist Thomas Hughes to discover why no flowers would grow in his garden at Bagnigge House, which stood in the vicinity of 61-63 King's Cross Road, London. He found the water from the well on the site to be full of iron. On this research, a second well was dug, the water from which was found to be a good purgative. This led to the establishment of one of the most popular 18th Century spas, Bagnigge Wells, the following year.
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in November, 1765.
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 astronomer
Astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist who studies celestial bodies such as planets, stars and galaxies.Historically, astronomy was more concerned with the classification and description of phenomena in the sky, while astrophysics attempted to explain these phenomena and the differences between them using...
. He is best known for discovering the Crab Nebula
Crab Nebula
The Crab Nebula is a supernova remnant and pulsar wind nebula in the constellation of Taurus...
in 1731.
Bevis has also observed an occultation
Occultation
An occultation is an event that occurs when one object is hidden by another object that passes between it and the observer. The word is used in astronomy . It can also refer to any situation wherein an object in the foreground blocks from view an object in the background...
by Venus
Venus
Venus is the second planet from the Sun, orbiting it every 224.7 Earth days. The planet is named after Venus, the Roman goddess of love and beauty. After the Moon, it is the brightest natural object in the night sky, reaching an apparent magnitude of −4.6, bright enough to cast shadows...
of Mercury
Mercury (planet)
Mercury is the innermost and smallest planet in the Solar System, orbiting the Sun once every 87.969 Earth days. The orbit of Mercury has the highest eccentricity of all the Solar System planets, and it has the smallest axial tilt. It completes three rotations about its axis for every two orbits...
on May 28, 1737, and observed and found a prediction rule for eclipses of Jupiter
Jupiter
Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest planet within the Solar System. It is a gas giant with mass one-thousandth that of the Sun but is two and a half times the mass of all the other planets in our Solar System combined. Jupiter is classified as a gas giant along with Saturn,...
's moons. From observations made with his telescope at Stoke Newington
Stoke Newington
Stoke Newington is a district in the London Borough of Hackney. It is north-east of Charing Cross.-Boundaries:In modern terms, Stoke Newington can be roughly defined by the N16 postcode area . Its southern boundary with Dalston is quite ill-defined too...
, Middlesex
Middlesex
Middlesex is one of the historic counties of England and the second smallest by area. The low-lying county contained the wealthy and politically independent City of London on its southern boundary and was dominated by it from a very early time...
, he compiled a star catalogue (more of an atlas) entitled Uranographia Britannica around 1750.
In 1757 he was asked by the tobacconist Thomas Hughes to discover why no flowers would grow in his garden at Bagnigge House, which stood in the vicinity of 61-63 King's Cross Road, London. He found the water from the well on the site to be full of iron. On this research, a second well was dug, the water from which was found to be a good purgative. This led to the establishment of one of the most popular 18th Century spas, Bagnigge Wells, the following year.
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in November, 1765.
External links
- Short biography at SEDS
- List of fellows of the RAS
- The story of Bagnigge Wells
- Uranographia Britannica, ca. 1745 - Full digital facsimile, Linda Hall LibraryLinda Hall LibraryThe Linda Hall Library is a privately-endowed American library of science, engineering and technology located in Kansas City, Missouri, about a "five-minute walk from Kansas City’s Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art." It is the "largest independently funded public library of science, engineering and...
.