Heveliana 2011–2016

Abstract

A number of publications devoted to Jan Heweliusz have been published between 2011 and 2016. On the occasion of the 400th anniversary of his birthday celebrated in 2011, four books have been published gathering the conferences and lectures, with a great deal of foreign authors presenting various aspects of the Gdańsk astronomer’s activities and achievements. In 2014, the publishing of Hevelius’s correspondence was initiated with the volume Prologomena. This article critically discusses the mentioned publications, pointing out their advantages and shortcomings. The preliminary study of the volume by Chantal Grell was also published in a Polish translation as a separate book. The author has indeed – more precisely than her predecessors – presented the years of Hevelius’s studies and the network of his correspondents, however overly emphasized his polemics with the French and English scholars. Her final conclusion, qualifying Hevelius as an amateur isolated from the leading currents of the seventeenth century, is contradictory to the evidence of his correspondence, which will be published over the next years.