Background

Adriaan Metius was born on December 9, 1571, in Alkmaar, Noord-Holland, Netherlands to the family of Adriaan Anthonisz and his wife Suida Direksd. His father was also a mathematician, land-surveyor, cartographer, and military engineer who from 1582 served also as burgomaster of Alkmaar. His brother was Jacob Metius an instrument-maker and inventor.

Education

Adriaan Metius was educated at the Latin school in Alkmaar. He entered the recently founded University of Franeker in Frisia in 1589, and in 1594 continued his studies at the University of Leiden. Among his teachers in Leiden were the mathematicians Rudolf Snellius and Van Ceulen. Like his townsman Blaeu, Adriaen worked under Tycho Brahe at his observatory on the island of Hven.

Career

Adriaan Metius went to Rostock and Jena, where in 1595 he gave his first lectures. He returned to the Netherlands where he assisted his father in his military engineering until, in 1598, he was appointed professor extraordinarius at Franeker; in the same year he published his first book, Doctrina spherica.

Metius became professor ordinarius of mathematics, surveying, navigation, military engineering, and astronomy at Franeker in 1600, a position he held until his death. He bought mathematical and astronomical instruments, observed sunspots, and showed familiarity with the telescope, of which his brother Jacob was a coinventor. He especially appreciated its use for measuring instruments. In his Geometria practica (Franeker, 1625) he described a triangulation of part of Frisia, made shortly after Rudolf Snellius’ son Willebrord had published his triangulation of the west Netherlands in Eratosthenes batavus (1617). Metius was a popular and efficient teacher who stressed the training of Frisian surveyors. His lectures were well attended by an international audience including, in 1629, Descartes.

Metius’s books cover all fields that he taught, and although they show little originality, they were widely used in his time.

Achievements

• Adriaan Metius was a renowned scientist of his time. Through his publications, he repeatedly won the esteem of the government. In 1625 he received an honorary doctorate in medicine from Franeker. The lunar crater Metius is named after him. On Jan Vermeer's image The astronomer is the book Institutiones Astronomicae Geographicae of Metius pitched on the table.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Adriani Metii Alcmar Astrolabium, Hoc Est Astrolabii Utiusque Accurata Descriptio 1626
  • Adriani Metii Alcmar. prof. mathes. in Acad. Frisiorum De genuino usu utriusque globi tractatus. : Adjecta est nova sciatericorum, & artis navigandi ratio novis instrumentis, & inventionibus illustrata 1626
  • Institutionum astronomicarum tomi tres, in quibus praecepta & praxis per sphaeramm, cum solidam ac planam 1608

Views

Metius followed Tycho Brahe’s theory of the solar system, but also showed respect for the Copernican system. While not accepting astrology, he did believe in alchemy and spent money in the search for the transmutation of metals.

Personality

Metius's motto was “Simpliciter et sine strepitu,” which means "simply and without noise."

Connections

Metius was married twice, first to Jetske Andreae, and then to Cecelia Vertest. He left no children.

Father:

Adriaan Anthonisz

Mother:

Suida Direksd

Brother:

Jacob Metius

Wife:

Jetske Andreae

Wife:

Cecelia Vertest

mentor:

Tycho Brahe

References

• Dictionary of Scientific Biography: Volumes 9 & 10
  1981