Domenico Maria Novara da Ferrara

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Domenico Maria Novara (Ferrara, 1454-1504) was an astronomer and a professor at the university of Bologna for 21 years. He was also an astrologer, perhaps for economical reasons (as it was common at those times).

Posthumous, he became famous for having been Nicolaus Copernicus' teacher. Copernicus started out as Novara's student and then became his assistant and co-worker. Novara, in turn, had declared that his teacher was the famous astronomer Regiomontanus, who was once the pupil of Georg Purbach.

Novara's writings are largely lost except for a few astrological almanacs, written for the university. Yet, it is recorded in Copernicus' De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (which was published in 1543 long after Novara's death) that on 9 March 1497, Novara witnessed Copernicus' first observation. Both men were described as free minds and free souls, and Novara believed that his^{[citation needed]} findings would have shaken the unshakable Ptolemy's geocentric System.