"Had it appeared a century before Napier, would not physical astronomy have been as far advanced in his time as it was a century after, and would not NAPIER have been NEWTON? But there were many persons having thoughts of such a table of numbers besides the few who are said to have attempted it! Dr Hutton, in support of this assertion... clings to Byrgius;"Kepler also says, that one Juste Byrge, assistant astronomer to the Landgrave of Hesse, invented or projected Logarithms long before Neper did, but that they had never come abroad on account of the great reservedness of their author with regard to his own compositions."But Hutton, though he suppresses what... qualifies the words of Kepler, and ventures not into the slightest examination of the pretension for Byrgius (who never made it for himself) is fond of the story, and does what he can to fix it upon the legislator of the stars as an unqualified assertion of his; for, speaking of the Rudolphine Tables, our author takes occasion to repeat,"and here it is that he (Kepler) mentions Justus Byrgius as having had Logarithms before Napier published them.""
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Ref: , Mathematical Tables (1801) History of Logarithms p. 24.
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Jost Bürgi
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