Bible Knowledge Graph

Nicholas of Cusa

Entity ID:

nicholas-of-cusa

Long Name:

Nicholas, of Cusa, Cardinal, 1401-1464

Short Name:

Nicholas of Cusa

Disambiguation String:

German cardinal and philosopher

Entity Type:

person

Entity Subtype:

author

wikimedia.org

Summary:

Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) (1401–1464), German humanist, scientist, statesman, and philosopher, cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church.

The son of a fisherman, Nicholas was educated at Deventer, Heidelberg, Padua, Rome, and Cologne. He became bishop of Brixon (Bressanone) in 1450 and instituted widespread, though temporary, reforms of the monasteries. As papal legate he traveled throughout Europe preaching and negotiating diplomatic affairs for the Holy See. Nicholas' greatest achievements were in science and philosophy. His researches and writings formed major advances in Renaissance mathematics, astronomy, and mysticism. He held, before the time of Copernicus and Newton, that the nearly spherical earth revolves on its axis about the sun and that the stars are other worlds. He described the Gregorian calendar reform in detail, before it occurred. In mathematics Nicholas propounded significant concepts of the infinitesimal and contributed to modern relativity theory. His mystical religious philosophy was set forth in his essays De Docta Ignorantia [of learned ignorance] (1440, tr. 1954), De Conjuncturis Libri Duo, and De Visio Dei [vision of God] (1453, tr. 1928). It anticipated the direction of growth of Renaissance conjecture concerning the nature of man and his relationship to the cosmos.

Viaf ID:

2488798

DB Pedia ID:

Nicholas_of_Cusa

Biblical Status:

Not Biblical

Is An Individual:

Yes

Is Published:

Yes

Birth Date:

January 1, 1401

Death Date:

August 11, 1464

Occupation:

German cardinal and philosopher

Nationality:

German

Works: