Nicolaus Copernicus pioneering contribution to the Scientific Revolution. Copernicus was born and died in Royal Prussia, a region that had been part of the Kingdom of Poland since 1466. A polyglot and polymath, he obtained a doctorate in canon law and was also a mathematician, astronomer, physician, classics scholar, translator, governor, diplomat, and economist. In 1517 he derived a quantity theory of money – a key concept in economics – and in 1519 he formulated an economic principle that later came to be called Gresham's law. Nicolaus Copernicus was born on 19 February 1473 in the city of Thorn (modern Toruń), in
Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille Abbé Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille, formerly sometimes spelled de la Caille, (; 15 March 1713 – 21 March 1762) was a French astronomer. Born at Rumigny (in present-day Ardennes), he attended school in Mantes-sur-Seine (now Mantes-la-Jolie). Afterwards, he studied rhetoric and philosophy at the and then theology at the Collège de Navarre. He was left destitute in 1731 by the death of his father, who had held a post in the household of the duchess of Vendôme. However, he was supported in his studies by the Duc de Bourbon, his father's former patron. After he graduated, he did