Ferdinand Augustin Hallerstein

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Ferdinand Augustin Haller von Hallerstein, or Liu Songling
Born(1703-08-27)27 August 1703
Peking, China
Known forfirst astrolabe at the Beijing observatory
Scientific career
FieldsAstronomy, demography, mathematics
InstitutionsHead of the Imperial Astronomical Bureau and Board of Mathematics in Peking

Ferdinand Augustin Haller von Hallerstein (

demographer in China who precisely calculated the exact number of Chinese population of the time (198,214,553). He also participated in Chinese cartography, serving concurrently as a missionary, "cultural ambassador" and mandarin
between 1739 and 1774.

Life and work

Ravbar Castle

Hallerstein was born on 27 August 1703 in

Jesuit college in Ljubljana.[8]

He was a member of the

Academy of Sciences in all the three cities, from Germany and Vienna, where he mainly published his scientific disputes, to Rome and Lisbon, the city of his correspondence and of his personal friend – the Queen of Portugal. It was from Portugal that he travelled to India as a missionary, where he worked in Goa and Macau and then continued his travel to Beijing
, China.

The former Beijing Astronomical Observatory, now a museum, still hosts the armillary sphere with rotating rings, which was made under Hallerstein's leadership and is considered the most prominent astronomical instrument.

His list and the Chinese translation reached Europe in 1779. The Chinese emperors objected to census-taking, or at least to census-publication, lest the Chinese might recognize their strength and grow restless. It confirms all the calculations of one of his predecessors,

Father Amiot
and affords proof of the progressive increase of the Chinese population. In the 25th year, he found 196,837,977 souls, and in the following year, 198,214,624. Hallerstein's census is to be found in "Déscription Générale de la Chine", p. 283.

He was buried in the Jesuits' Zhalan Cemetery in Beijing.

Legacy

In Budapest, translations of his letters were published in the 18th century.

A part of the Third Conference of the European Society for the

History of Science
was dedicated to Hallerstein and his transfer of mid-European science to Beijing and back. In recent years he has attracted the attention of Chinese historians as the creator of the most intriguing astronomic instrument at the old Beijing observatory, the spherical astrolabe, a "celestial globe".

The asteroid

15071 Hallerstein is named after Hallerstein.[9]

References

  1. ^ Фердинанд Августин Галлерштейн 27 авг. 1703 г. – 29 окт. 1774 г.
  2. ^ a b Hribar, Viljem Marjan (2003). Mandarin: Hallerstein, kranjec na kitajskem dvoru. Mengeš: Muzej Mengeš. p. 144.
  3. ^ "Spomin na Hallersteina, astronoma, ki ga je pot zanesla na Kitajsko". RTV SLO. 29 October 2014. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
  4. ^ "Hallerstein je v Sloveniji pustil neizbrisljiv pečat". STA Znanost. STA. 11 October 2017. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
  5. ^ Umek, Ema; Prosen, Marijan (1990). "Avguštin Hallerstein". Enciklopedija Slovenije. Vol. 4. Ljubljana: Mladinska knjiga. p. 5.
  6. ^ Sandi Sitar, Sto slovenskih znanstvenikov (Ljubljana: Prešernova družba, 1987), 25.
  7. ^ Taufbuch. Ljubljana – Sv. Nikolaj. 1700–1712. p. 106. Retrieved 1 January 2023.
  8. ^ Sandi Sitar, Sto slovenskih znanstvenikov (Ljubljana: Prešernova družba, 1987), 25.
  9. ^ "Slovenski jezuit, ki ima svoj asteroid" [A Slovene Jesuit Who Has His Own Asteroid]. MMC RTV Slovenija (in Slovenian). RTV Slovenija.
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