In the 16th century Nicholas Copernicus revived the heliocentric model of the solar system devised by Aristarchus (which survives primarily in a passing mention in the Sand Reckoner of Archimedes). When this model was published at the end of his life, it was with a preface by Osiander that piously represented it as only a mathematical convenience for calculating the positions of planets, and not an account of the true nature of the planetary orbits.
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