Maximilianus Hell (1720-1792) - Munin

Collegii Academici Societatis Jesu Tyrnaviae in Hungaria habitae, Tyrnavia 1759-72,
covering the years 1756-1771). Like Hell, Weiss initiated a direct correspondence with
several leading astronomers abroad, among them Lalande and Wargentin. However, he
appears not to have become a formal member of any of the foreign academies, and his works
were limited to the field of practical astronomy.
Whereas the careers of Hell and Weiss established them as leading astronomers in Vienna and
Hungary respectively, it is noteworthy that there were other ways in which to pursue a career
in astronomy and related branches of “mathematics”. Absence of observatories did not imply
that astronomy was not studied at other collegia. In Cassovia, for instance, barely sixty
kilometres southeast of Trenchinium where Hell taught in 1745-47, a 291-page Hungaria
coelestis astronomiam et chronologiam in synopsi complectens (‘Heavenly Hungary,
Providing a Synopsis of Astronomy and Chronology’) was issued in 1741. The author of this
“Baroque synthesis of science and triumphalist history”, 154 the university professor of
mathematics Michael Lipsicz SJ 155 merits some consideration. Lipsicz was born in 1703 in
Ovaria, 156 barely 20 kilometres south of Posonium, 157 which was then the capital of Hungary.
Before his arrival in Cassovia, Lipsicz had taught mathematics in Claudiopolis (1736/37), that
is almost twenty years earlier than Hell. After his short period in Claudiopolis, Lipsicz stayed
at the Cassovian university during 1737-42, before he moved on to become a professor of
mathematics and physics in Tyrnavia (1742-45). Franciscus Weiss may have been among his
pupils. Lipsicz appears not to have engaged in practical astronomy, however, and most of his
works listed in an online bibliography compiled by the National Library in Zagreb treat
juridical or historical subjects. 158 He did not take part in the flourishing of Jesuit astronomy in
the Austrian Province around 1750, but instead taught non-mathematical curricula or held
administrative posts at various Jesuit institutions within the Kingdom of Hungary (Tyrnavia,
Agria, 159 Buda, Zagrabia, Jaurinum and Sopronium 160 from 1745 until his death in Jaurinum
in 1766. 161
154
Shore 2007, p. 164.
155
Also spelled Lipsics, Lipšić or Lipsits.
156
Ovaria, Ovarinum or Ad Flexum (L) = Ungarish-Altenburg (G), Magyaróvár (H), since 1939 merged with
neighbouring Wieselburg (G) / Moson (H) and known as Mosonmagyaróvár.
157
Posonium (L) = Preßburg (G), Poczony (H), Bratislava (Sl).
158
http://161.53.3.18/cgi-bin/unicat.cgi?form=010000000199990&id=0200705097 (accessed 7 January 2011).
159
Agria (L) = Erlau (G), Eger (H).
160
Sopronium, Sempronium, Oedenburgum or Scarabantia (L) = Ödenburg (G), Šopron (Croatian), Sopron (H).
161
Unless stated otherwise, biographical information on Lipsicz has been taken from Wurzbach, Fünfzehnter
Theil (1866) and Fischer 1978.
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