1551 in science

Mathematics

• Georg Joachim Rheticus publishes Canon of the Science of Triangles.

Medicine

• By July – Fifth and last outbreak of sweating sickness in England. Dr. John Caius writes the first full contemporary account of the symptoms of the disease.
• Conrad Gessner is the first to describe adipose tissue.

Zoology

• Pierre Belon publishes Histoire naturelle des estranges poissons.
• Conrad Gessner begins publication of his encyclopedic illustrated Historiae animalium in Zurich.

Publications

• Martín Cortés de Albacar publishes Breve compendio de la esfera y del arte de navegar in Spain, an influential work in cosmography, proposing spherical charts and mentioning magnetic deviation and the existence of magnetic poles.

Births

• approx. date – Timothy Bright, English physician (died 1615)

Deaths

• April 6 – Joachim Vadian, Swiss physician and polymath (born 1484)
• May 6 − Johannes Baptista Montanus Italian physician and humanist (born 1498)
• August 8 – Fray Tomás de Berlanga, Spanish Bishop of Panama and discoverer of the Galápagos Islands (born 1487)

References