Editing Nicholas Mercator

[[File:Nicolaus Mercator Logarithmotechnia.png|thumb|]]
{{Short description|German mathematician (c.1620 – 1687)}}
{{distinguish|text=[[Gerardus Mercator]] the cartographer}}

'''Nicholas''' (Nikolaus) '''Mercator''' (c. 1620, [[Holstein]] – 1687, [[Versailles (city)|Versailles]]), also known by his [[German language|German]] name Kauffmann, was a 17th-century [[mathematician]].

He was born in [[Eutin]], [[Schleswig-Holstein]], [[Germany]] and educated at [[University of Rostock|Rostock]] and [[Leiden University|Leyden]] after which he lived from 1642 to 1648 in the [[Netherlands]]. He lectured at the [[University of Copenhagen]] during 1648–1654 and lived in [[Paris]] from 1655 to 1657. He was mathematics tutor to [[Joscelyne Percy]], son of the 10th [[Earl of Northumberland]], at [[Petworth]], [[Sussex]] (1657). He taught mathematics in London (1658–1682).  On 3 May 1661 he observed a [[transit of Mercury]] with [[Christiaan Huygens]] and [[Thomas Street (astronomer)|Thomas Streete]] from [[Long Acre]], London.<ref>{{Cite journal|title=1904Obs....27..369L Page 369|url=http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1904Obs....27..369L|access-date=2021-08-03|website=articles.adsabs.harvard.edu|bibcode=1904Obs....27..369L }}</ref> On 14 November 1666 he was elected a [[Fellow of the Royal Society]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=Search Results|url=https://catalogues.royalsociety.org/CalmView/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Persons&id=NA7751&pos=1|access-date=2021-08-03|website=catalogues.royalsociety.org}}</ref> He designed a marine chronometer for [[Charles II of England|Charles II]].<ref>[[Thomas Birch]] (on chronometer) (1756) History of the Royal Society II : 110 to 114 and 187, and in Oldenburg to Leibnitz 18 December 1670</ref>

In 1682 [[Jean Colbert]] invited Mercator to assist in the design and construction of the fountains at the [[Palace of Versailles]], so he relocated there, but a falling-out with Colbert followed.<ref>[[D. T. Whiteside]] [http://www.encyclopedia.com/science/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/mercator-nicolaus-kauffman-niklaus Nicolaus Mercator] at [[Encyclopedia.com]]</ref>

Mathematically, he is most well known for his treatise ''Logarithmo-technia'' on [[logarithms]], published in 1668. In this treatise he described the [[Mercator series]]:

:<math>\ln(1 + x) = x - \frac{1}{2}x^2 + \frac{1}{3}x^3 - \frac{1}{4}x^4 + \cdots.</math>

Nicholas Mercator was the first person to use the term [[natural logarithm]].<ref>{{cite web |author-first1=J. J. |author-last1=O'Connor |author-first2=E. F. |author-last2=Robertson |url=http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/HistTopics/e.html |title=The number e |publisher=The MacTutor History of Mathematics archive |date=September 2001 |access-date=2009-02-02}}</ref>

To the field of music, Mercator contributed the first precise account of [[53 equal temperament]], which was of theoretical importance, but not widely practised.<ref>Benjamin Wardhaugh (July 2010) [https://www.maa.org/press/periodicals/convergence/a-plague-of-ratios A Plague of Ratios] from [[Mathematics Association of America]]
</ref>

He died at Versailles in 1687.

==Works==
[[File:Mercator, Nicolaus – Institutionum astronomicarum libri, 1685 – BEIC 1397087.jpg|thumb|''Institutionum astronomicarum libri'', 1685]]
* 1676: ''Institutionum astronomicarum'', London (1685, Padua)
* {{Cite book|title=Institutionum astronomicarum libri duo|volume=|publisher=Tipografia del Seminario|location=Pavia|year=1685|language=la|url=https://gutenberg.beic.it/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=1397087}}
* Kinkhuysen (1661) ''Algebra ofte Stelkonst'', translated by N. Mercator, appears 1968 in ''Mathematical Papers of Isaac Newton'' II: 295–364 with Newton commentary 364–446.
* 1664: ''Hypothesis astronomica nova'', London
* 1666: "Certain problems touching some points of navigation", [[Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society]] 1:  215–18
* 1668: [https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/009310290?type%5B%5D=title&lookfor%5B%5D=logarithmotechnia&ft=ft Logarithmo-technia] from [[HathiTrust]] or [https://archive.org/details/ita-bnc-mag-00000857-001 Logarithmtechnia] from [[Internet Archive]]
* Wallis (1668) Review of ''Logarithmotechnia'', ''Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society'' 3: 753–9, followed by "Some further Illustration" by N. Mercator, pp 759–64.
* 1670: "Some considerations … method of Cassini", ''Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society'' 5: 1168–75.

==References==
{{Reflist}}
* [[Euclid Speidell]] (1688) {{Google books|9l6zSrUQL0UC|Logarithmotechnia: the making of numbers called logarithms}}
* Francis Maseres & [[Charles Hutton]] (1791) [https://books.google.com/books?id=FZciAQAAMAAJ Scriptores Logarithmici], link from [[Google Books]].
* [[John Aubrey]] (1813) ''Letters and Lives of Eminent Men'' II: 450,1, 473

== External links ==
* [http://www.maths.tcd.ie/pub/HistMath/People/17thCentury/RouseBall/RB_Math17C.html#NMercator Some Contemporaries of Descartes, Fermat, Pascal, and Huygens: N. Mercator]
* {{MacTutor Biography|id=Mercator_Nicolaus}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mercator, Nicholas}}
[[Category:1620s births]]
[[Category:1687 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Eutin]]
[[Category:17th-century German mathematicians]]
[[Category:Music theorists]]
[[Category:Fellows of the Royal Society]]