19 February 23

Early astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus was born on 19 February 1473. He became famous for the Copernican solar system, where the sun is the center of the universe, and the earth circles it once per year. His astronomical observations, all done before the telescope was invented (around 1608), became the foundation for his shocking conclusion that "THE EARTH MOVES!" (The ancient Ptolemaic astronomy was founded on the principle that the earth was stationary.) Copernicus' ideas, published after his death in 1543, were debated widely, but the real scientific proofs of the Copernican system came around 1630 with the telescopic observations of Galileo. My tie shows sunbursts and number tables which seem to count calendar cycles for heavenly events.