1543
Copernicus Publishes De Revolutionibus
On his deathbed, the Polish canon Nicolaus Copernicus received a printed copy of his long-hidden De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium. It argued that the Earth was a planet, circling the Sun at the center of the universe. Copernicus died the same day, perhaps before he fully understood what he had unleashed.
Cartier Abandons Canada
Jacques Cartier loaded what he believed were diamonds and gold onto his ships and sailed home from the St. Lawrence after a miserable winter of scurvy and hostile Iroquois raids. The stones turned out to be quartz and iron pyrite. French Canada plans were shelved for sixty years. The false diamonds entered French as the proverb faux comme les diamants du Canada, discrediting Canadian exploration for decades.
Vesalius Publishes De Humani Corporis Fabrica
The Flemish anatomist Andreas Vesalius, teaching at Padua, released a folio of stunningly illustrated dissections that corrected hundreds of errors in Galen. Skeletons posed thoughtfully against Italian landscapes while muscles peeled themselves back page by page. Modern anatomy had a birthday. The illustrations, from Titian's workshop, set a new standard for scientific illustration combining artistic beauty with anatomical precision.
Tartaglia Publishes General Trattato
The self-taught Venetian mathematician Niccolo Tartaglia published his General Trattato, popularizing algebraic methods and the solutions to cubic equations. He had quarreled bitterly with Cardano over priority. Italian mathematics was hurtling toward the invention of imaginary numbers, complex analysis, and modern symbolic algebra. His priority dispute with Cardano became Renaissance mathematics' most famous quarrel, conducted through printed pamphlets and public challenges.
Henry VIII Marries Catherine Parr
The aging, obese Henry VIII married his sixth and last wife, the twice-widowed Catherine Parr, in a quiet ceremony at Hampton Court. A learned Protestant, she acted as regent during his war in France and helped reconcile him with his daughters Mary and Elizabeth. She would outlive him by less than two years.