Campanus of Novara

Campanus of Novara (about 1220 to 1296) was an Italian mathematician, astronomer, astrologer and physician of the thirteenth century, best known for his work on Euclid's Elements. His birth date is uncertain and his birthplace was probably Novara in Piedmont. He served as chaplain to several popes, among them Urban IV and Boniface VIII, and Roger Bacon named him as one of two good mathematicians of his time. His Latin edition of the Elements in fifteen books, based on a compilation by Robert of Chester and drawing on Jordanus de Nemore and on commentary by Anaritius, was the most frequently used compilation of Euclid until the sixteenth century and became the first printed edition of Euclid, published in Venice in 1482. In astronomy he wrote the Theorica Planetarum, a geometrical account of planetary motion with instructions for building an equatorium. He died at Viterbo, and a lunar crater is named for him.