Austrian mathematician and astronomer. Born 1423, died 1461.
One of the pioneers of the flowering of astronomy in the 15th century, Peurbach served as astrologer to the King of Hungary from 1454, and as astronomer at the the University of Vienna/Wien. In 1456, Peurbach observed and described Halley's Comet.
Peurbach worked with his pupil Regiomontanus in republishing the works of Ptolemaios. Published c. 1474 by Regimontanus, Peurbach's magnum opus is the Theoricae novae planetarum, which refines the epicycle theory of Ptolemaios. The Theoricae was much used as a textbook of astronomy in the 16th and 17th centuries.