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Chemical analyses find hidden elements (such as tungsten) from renaissance astronomer Tycho Brahe’s alchemy laboratory, Uraniborg

Tycho Brahe was most famous for his contributions to astronomy. However, he also had a well-equipped alchemical laboratory where he produced secret medicines for Europe’s elite.

Tycho Brahe’s alchemy laboratory, Uraniborg Tycho Brahe receives Jacob VI of Scotland at Uraniborg, Credits: Royal Library, Denmark — Chemical analyses find hidden elements (such as tungsten) from renaissance astronomer Tycho Brahe’s alchemy laboratory, Uraniborg. In the picture, Tycho Brahe receives Jacob VI of Scotland at Uraniborg, Credits: Royal Library, Denmark

In the Middle Ages, alchemists were notoriously secretive and didn’t share their knowledge with others. Danish Tycho Brahe was no exception. Consequently, we don’t know precisely what he did in the alchemical laboratory located beneath his combined residence and observatory, Uraniborg, on the now Swedish island of Ven.

Only a few of his alchemical recipes have survived, and today, there are very few remnants of his laboratory. Uraniborg was demolished after his death in 1601, and the building materials were scattered for reuse.

However, during an excavation in 1988-1990, some pottery and glass shards were found in Uraniborg’s old garden. These shards were believed to originate from the basement’s alchemical laboratory. Five of these shards—four glass and one ceramic—have now undergone chemical analyses to determine which elements the original glass and ceramic containers came into contact with.

The chemical analyses were conducted by Professor Emeritus and expert in archaeometry, Kaare Lund Rasmussen from the Department of Physics, Chemistry, and Pharmacy, University of Southern Denmark. Senior researcher and museum curator Poul Grinder-Hansen from the National Museum of Denmark oversaw the insertion of the analyses into historical context.

Enriched levels of trace elements were found on four of them, while one glass shard showed no specific enrichments. The study has been published in the journal Heritage Science (link to be provided).

“Most intriguing are the elements found in higher concentrations than expected—indicating enrichment and providing insight into the substances used in Tycho Brahe’s alchemical laboratory”, said Kaare Lund Rasmussen.

The enriched elements are nickel, copper, zinc, tin, antimony, tungsten, gold, mercury, and lead, and they have been found on either the inside or outside of the shards.

Most of them are not surprising for an alchemist’s laboratory. Gold and mercury were – at least among the upper echelons of society – commonly known and used against a wide range of diseases.

“But tungsten is very mysterious. Tungsten had not even been described at that time, so what should we infer from its presence on a shard from Tycho Brahe’s alchemy workshop?”, said Kaare Lund Rasmussen.

Tungsten was first described and produced in pure form more than 180 years later by the Swedish chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele. Tungsten occurs naturally in certain minerals, and perhaps the element found its way to Tycho Brahe’s laboratory through one of these minerals. In the laboratory, the mineral might have undergone some processing that separated the tungsten, without Tycho Brahe ever realizing it.

However, there is also another possibility that Professor Kaare Lund Rasmussen emphasizes has no evidence whatsoever – but which could be plausible.

Already in the first half of the 1500s, the German mineralogist Georgius Agricola described something strange in tin ore from Saxony, which caused problems when he tried to smelt tin. Agricola called this strange substance in the tin ore “Wolfram” (German for Wolf’s froth, later renamed to tungsten in English).

“Maybe Tycho Brahe had heard about this and thus knew of tungsten’s existence. But this is not something we know or can say based on the analyses I have done. It is merely a possible theoretical explanation for why we find tungsten in the samples”, said Kaare Lund Rasmussen.

Tycho Brahe belonged to the branch of alchemists who, inspired by the German physician Paracelsus, tried to develop medicine for various diseases of the time: plague, syphilis, leprosy, fever, stomach aches, etc. But he distanced himself from the branch that tried to create gold from less valuable minerals and metals.

In line with the other medical alchemists of the time, he kept his recipes close to his chest and shared them only with a few selected individuals, such as his patron, Emperor Rudolph II, who allegedly received Tycho Brahe’s prescriptions for plague medicine.

We know that Tycho Brahe’s plague medicine was complicated to produce. It contained theriac, which was one of the standard remedies for almost everything at the time and could have up to 60 ingredients, including snake flesh and opium. It also contained copper or iron vitriol (sulphates), various oils, and herbs.

After various filtrations and distillations, the first of Brahe’s three recipes against plague was obtained. This could be made even more potent by adding tinctures of, for example, coral, sapphires, hyacinths, or potable gold.

“It may seem strange that Tycho Brahe was involved in both astronomy and alchemy, but when one understands his worldview, it makes sense. He believed that there were obvious connections between the heavenly bodies, earthly substances, and the body’s organs. Thus, the Sun, gold, and the heart were connected, and the same applied to the Moon, silver, and the brain; Jupiter, tin, and the liver; Venus, copper, and the kidneys; Saturn, lead, and the spleen; Mars, iron, and the gallbladder; and Mercury, mercury, and the lungs. Minerals and gemstones could also be linked to this system, so emeralds, for example, belonged to Mercury”, explained Poul Grinder-Hansen.

Kaare Lund Rasmussen has previously analyzed hair and bones from Tycho Brahe and found, among other elements, gold. This could indicate that Tycho Brahe himself had taken medicine that contained potable gold.

Bibliographic information:

Chemical analysis of fragments of glass and ceramic ware from Tycho Brahe’s laboratory at Uraniborg on the island of Ven (Sweden), Heritage Science (25-Jul-2024)

Press release from the University of Southern Denmark, by Birgitte Svennevig.

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Wilhelm Schickard invented the mechanical calculator 400 years ago

A letter from Tübingen universal scientist Wilhelm Schickard to the famous astronomer Johannes Kepler on September 20, 1623, documents the invention of the first mechanical calculator:

“Moreover, I have recently attempted the same by mechanical means as you have done mathematically, and constructed a machine consisting of eleven complete and six modified small wheels.”

With delicate lines, Schickard sketched the design of his invention.

Replica of Wilhelm Schickard’s calculator. Location: University of Tübingen Mueum. Credit: MUT/V. Marquardt

Using up to six-digit figures, the construction could undertake all types of basic calculation: addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Its greatest feature however was the automatic carrying of tens, at which point a small bell apparently rang as the last digit changed from 9 to 0. Schickard was now able to calculate the movements of heavenly bodies faster and more easily than was possible manually.

The central element of the mechanical calculator was an adding machine with six cogwheels which could be used to set numbers from 0 to 9. This added up if rotated clockwise, while turning anticlockwise subtracted. For multiplication, Schickard integrated a system reminiscent of the calculating rods of Scottish scholar John Napier, and combined them with the cogs of the mechanical adder, which defined the multiplier. The numbers simply had to be set and the results could be read out – the machine did the actual calculating.

The Tübingen calculating machine was closely related chronologically to the revolution in natural sciences at the start of the 17^th century. The work of astronomers Tycho Brahe, Galileo Galilei and Johannes Kepler had shown that natural phenomena – such as the movement of the planets – could be precisely predicted through observation, measurement and calculation. The sciences were also being taken seriously and promoted in political circles, with many at that time believing that the future could also be foretold from the positions of heavenly bodies. However, the mathematical challenges were increasing with the ever more complex calculations involved in the still-young sciences. Yet undertaking calculations with large numbers is prone to mistakes.

“In particular when adding long series of numbers, Schickard’s calculating machine could have been a great relief, as it could help to avoid miscalculations,” explains Tübingen computer scientist, Professor Herbert Klaeren.

“Schickard’s construction contains the core elements of computer science,” says Professor Oliver Bringmann, speaker of the Department of Computer Science at the University of Tübingen. “It defines calculation rules and applies them in an automated process.” Calculating machines with greater capacity were not built until the 18^th century.

Constructing the machine and experimenting with it accompanied Schickard’s work at the University of Tübingen. In 1619 the theologian was appointed Professor of Hebrew and other biblical languages. He developed a study aid for his students consisting of rotating stacked discs with Hebraic verbs and endings to enable them to learn the complicated conjugations more easily. Even Isaac Newton had one. In 1631 Schickard was appointed to the Chair of Astronomy, Mathematics and Geodesics as the successor to astronomer and mathematician Michael Mästlin. Using a hand-held planetarium of his own invention, he showed the movements of the sun, the earth and the moon, and a conical star chart simplified identification of the constellations. As a school warden, he inspected Latin schools in Württemberg and surveyed the state while on his travels. From this data he drew far more precise maps than had previously been possible.

Johannes Kepler, who like Schickard studied at the University of Tübingen, became aware of his younger colleague as early as 1617. Kepler clearly recognized young Schickard’s powerful intellect and passion for mathematics at this time, and encouraged him to study science. From then on, Kepler and Schickard corresponded, and they met up again when Kepler returned to Württemberg in 1620 to assist his mother who was on trial for witchcraft. The astronomer valued Schickard’s skills as a craftsman and an artist, and engaged him to make copperplates and woodcuts for his revolutionary work “Harmonice mundi”, in which Kepler formulated the laws of planetary movements. Schickard for his part knew how much time Kepler spent calculating planetary orbits, and wanted to make the task easier for his friend.

Presentation of 20 euro commemorative coin and stamp

So Schickard commissioned the construction of a “calculating clock”, as he called it, by the craftsman-mechanic Johann Pfister, who built one model for Schickard in 1623 and later a second model intended for Kepler. However, Kepler’s model was destroyed by a fire in Pfister’s workshop.

Schickard’s life had a tragic end. In the early days of the Thirty Years’ War, the City of Tübingen escaped destruction by paying huge amounts of money. Yet once the battle of Nördlingen was lost in 1634, imperial troops were quartered in Tübingen and brought the plague with them. First, it took Schickard’s wife and three daughters. Schickard himself fell ill, but recovered. In October 1635 he caught the plague again, and this time died, just one day before his nine year old son.

Wilhelm Schickard invented the mechanical calculator 400 years ago. Portrait of Wilhelm Schickard from 1632. In his right hand he holds the hand-held planetarium he invented, in his left, a conical map of the moon’s orbit. Credit: MUT / V. Marquardt

Following the death of Schickard and his family in the Black Death, the knowledge of his calculating machine and Schickard’s own model were lost in the chaos of the Thirty Years’ War. Erroneously, historians credited the French philosopher Blaise Pascal with inventing the first mechanical calculator, some twenty years later. Much later, Schickard’s sketches resurfaced, and after the Second World War the machine was reconstructed at the University of Tübingen thereby proving its effectiveness. In 1960 it was presented in public. Today, there are replicas in the computer collection of the University of Tübingen and the Tübingen city museum, among other places.

On September 14, 2023, the University of Tübingen will be celebrating the 400^th anniversary of Schickard’s invention with a ceremony in the Neue Aula. At the event, the Federal Ministry of Finance together with the University will showcase a 20 euro commemorative coin and an 85 cent commemorative stamp in honor of Wilhelm Schickard and his invention. Afterward, the University of Tübingen’s Department of Computer Science will be holding a symposium on the theme “From the mechanical calculator to quantum computing”.

Press release from the University of Tübingen

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