Valentin Naboth

At that time Philipp Melanchthon, Erasmus Reinhold, Johannes Bugenhagen, Paul Eber, and Georg Major taught there.

The Faculty council risked turning the courses in Mathematics over to this gifted but troubled Renaissance spirit even though he had not yet completed a Magister degree.

That decision was made at the meeting of 16 August 1551, and from then on Naboth taught Mathematics and the beginning astronomy course, the Sphaera materialis.

Shortly afterwards Liborius Mangold gave up after twelve years as rector of St. Georgsburse and as professor of physics and rhetoric, and accepted an administrative position in his native town of Warburg, and Naboth left as well.

In his commentary, he thanked the City that they had supported him in the early years, when mathematics was the only discipline not yet integrated into the general University curriculum.

[9] He visited Paris, where he met Czech humanist Šimon Proxenus ze Sudetu (1532–1575),[10] who introduced him to Petrus Ramus.

Renowned for calculating the mean annual motion of the Sun, his writings are chiefly devoted to commenting upon Ptolemy and the Arabian astrologers.

He advocated a measure of time, by which 0° 59' 8+1⁄3" (the mean daily motion of the Sun in longitude) is equated to 1 year of life in calculating primary directions.

In 1573 Naboth published an astronomy textbook for gymnasium students Primarum de coelo et terra, which was dedicated to Stephen Báthory.

Tommaso Campanella, in a work published in Lyon in 1629,[19] tells the story that Naboth was living in Padua, Italy, when he deduced from his own horoscope that he was about to enter a period of personal danger, so he stockpiled an adequate supply of food and drink, closed his blinds, and locked his doors and windows, intending to stay in hiding until the period of danger had passed.