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About the Image

Date
2004-10-06
ID
ssc2004-15c2
Type
Photograph
Credit
Courtesy of the Archives, California Institute of Technology

About the Object

Name
De Stella Nova

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10.06.04

Kepler's "De Stella Nova" (1606) Title Page

Johannes Kepler was a German Astronomer best known for the laws of planetary motion.Kepler documented the explosion of a supernova in 1604, which was the last such event observed in our Milky Way galaxy and would later be known as "Kepler's supernova."

Kepler wrote a book on the supernova of 1604 called De Stella Nova (Prague, 1606). An illustration in the book locates Kepler's supernova in the foot of the Ophiuchus constellation. This first edition copy belongs to the California Institute of Technology Archives and is one of 35 copies still in inexistence.