Mercator was not just a maker of maps

摘要

GERHARD CREMER was bom in Rupelmonde, Flanders, on 5 March 1512. After his father died a well connected uncle sent him to a school in the Netherlands that prepared poor but bright boys for the Catholic priesthood. There he developed a talent for calligraphy by copying out religious tracts. He also latinised his name to Gerardus Mercator Rupelmundanus. We know him today simply as Mercator. In 1530 Mercator entered the University of Louvain. He met Gemma Frisius, a physician, mathematician and scientific instrument maker, who taught him how to apply mathematics to astronomy, cartography and navigation, and Gaspar van der Heyden, a goldsmith and engraver, in whose workshop he acquired his engraving skills.