Valentin Naboth - Life and Academic Career

Life and Academic Career

Valentin Naboth was born in Calau (Niederlausitz) to an originally Jewish family. He was the younger brother of the Lutheran theologian and author Alexius Naboth. In 1544, Valentin immatriculated at the University of Wittenberg, at the time Philipp Melanchthon, Erasmus Reinhold, Johannes Bugenhagen, Paul Eber, and Georg Major taught there. In 1550 he transferred to the University of Erfurt.

Valentin Naboth was Baccalaurean when he came from Wittenberg to Erfurt, and had certainly an outstanding mathematical ability. The Faculty council took on the risk to turn the courses in Mathematics over to this gifted but troubled Renaissance spirit even though he had not yet a Magister degree. That decision was made at the meeting of 16 August 1551, and from then on Naboth taught Mathematics and Sphaera materialis. He also taught in the summer semester and winter semester of 1552. There was a plague epidemic, and the courses were shortened; Liborius Mangold taught only rhetoric and Naboth Sphaera. The conscientious Liborius Mangold from Warburg, who was Dean, did not seem to get along with the much favored mathematician Naboth, and when the latter even borrowed money from the University for the Magister's examination, Liborius wrote to the Dean's book, "quod prius nunquam nec visum nec auditum fuit". Valentin Naboth passed the examination. But right after he had his Magister’s degree, he wrote on February 6 a letter to the Faculty about which the Dean remarked that a letter in such a tone had never been seen or heard of before. Maybe it was one of the reasons why Liborius Mangold gave up after twelve years as rector of St. Georgsburse and a professor of physics and rhetoric, and accepted an administrative position in his native town of Warburg. But not only he left. Without saying a word Valentin Naboth went as well. The faculty waited in vain for him for the summer semester 1553, he didn’t come. The Faculty was still hoping for Naboth’s return and waited some more before replacing him. But Naboth had gone to the University of Cologne and matriculated there with the intention to teach mathematics at this major University – which he succeeded to do. Naboth remained in Cologne for a decade, but then this restless spirit couldn’t stay any longer, he moved on to the center of the mathematical studies of that time, at the University of Padua, and taught and wrote there. He had always been an eccentric, and became even more so over there.

From 1555 mathematician and physician Valentin Naboth taught mathematics at the University of Cologne, first privately, and from 1557 to 1564 as the holder of a "City" Professorship of mathematics. He succeeded Justus Velsius, who in 1556, on account of teachings deemed heretical by the Church, was obliged to leave Cologne. Dutch mathematician Rudolph Snellius was one of his students in Cologne.
In 1556 he published the first book of Euclid, and then his own mathematical commentary on the Arab astrologer Alchabitius, 1560, in which he opposed magic and superstition. In his mathematical work he followed Regiomontanus; but further on he preferred Ptolemy – in agreement with Cardanus. He prepared an edition of Ptolemy’s Quadripartitus, but that was never published. In his commentary, he thanked the City that they had him remunerated in the early years, when mathematics was the only discipline not yet integrated into the general University curriculum. If this remark is true – and that can hardly be questioned – then the official Professorship of Mathematics had in fact only now been established. However, in 1563 Laurentianer Petrus Linner requested that Naboth’s lecture be moved to another time, since he himself taught mathematics at his Gymnasium at the very same time. With that he opened up the discussion about competition from the Faculty and College curriculum. Furthermore, he argued that Naboth didn’t have a Magister degree from Cologne, but from somewhere else. And indeed, the Dean decided that henceforth no one could teach a course in the Schola Artium when simultaneously a lecture took place in one of three Gymnasiums. The basic problem with the Arts studies in Cologne could not have been made any clearer than that. Right away, Naboth took the consequences: he left Cologne and later taught in Padua.

In March 1564 Naboth resigned from his position at the University of Cologne. He visited Paris, where he met Czech humanist Šimon Proxenus ze Sudetu (1532–1575), who introduced him to Petrus Ramus. Afterwards Naboth traveled to Italy, eventually settling in Padua, where he taught astronomy. Among his students there was a nephew of Prince Stephen Báthory of Transylvania.