Biography of Philipp Matthäus Hahn (1739-1790)

Already at his lifetime the German vicar Philipp Matthäus Hahn was known in church circles through his theological writings, with princes and nobles by his large astronomical clocks and machines in and the upper middle class through its pocket watches, scales and his calculating machine.

Hahn was born on 25th of November, 1739 in Scharnhausen, Esslingen, as the second of ten children in a family of a pastor. From 1749 to 1754 he attended Latin schools in Esslingen and in Nürtingen. During this time he became interested in astronomical observations and even tried to construct sundials. From 1756 to 1760 he studied theology at the Protestant theological seminary Tübinger Stift in Tübingen. It is amazing, that some 150 years before Hahn, in the same college studied also theology the inventor of the first mechanical calculating machine—Wilhelm Schickard, however Hahn, in contrast to Schickard, later on will reject the proposed to him professorship of mathematics here.

http://history-computer.com/People/HahnBio.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthaeus_Hahn

http://www.rechenmaschinen-illustrated.com/pictures_1623.htm

http://blog.dugnorth.com/2008/11/astrolabium-clock-time-earth-sun-and.html


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