The Sleepwalkers (81 page)

They
were
even
less
happy
than
the
earlier
ones
had
been.
In
addition
to
the
doubts
and
worries
concerning
the
publication
of
the
book,
the
Canon
had
become
involved
in
an
absurd
conflict
with
his
new
Bishop.
This
Bishop,
Johannes
Dantiscus,
weighed
as
heavily
on
the
end
of
Canon
Nicolas'
life
as
Bishop
Lucas
had
weighed
on
its
beginning.
In
all
other
respects,
the
radiant
Dantiscus
was
as
complete
a
contrast
to
the
sombre
Lucas
as
could
be
invented.

He
was
one
of
the
outstanding
diplomats
of
the
Renaissance,
a
poet
laureate
who
composed
erotic
verse
in
his
youth
and
religious
hymns
in
his
old
age;
^*
a
traveller,
humanist,
conversational
charmer,
and
altogether
a
character
of
great
attractiveness
and
complexity.
Bishop
Lucas
had
been
by
twenty-six
years
Nicolas'
senior,
Bishop
Dantiscus
was
by
twelve
years
his
junior,
yet
Nicolas
was
as
submissive
to
the
latter
as
he
had
been
to
the
former.
This
submission
to
authority
–
to
Lucas
and
Dantiscus
on
the
one
hand,
to
Ptolemy
and
Aristotle
on
the
other
–
is
perhaps
the
main
clue
to
Copernicus'
personality.
It
undermined
his
independence
of
character
and
his
independence
of
thought,
kept
him
in
self-imposed
bondage,
and
singled
him
out
as
an
austere
relic
of
the
Middle
Ages
among
the
humanists
of
the
Renaissance.

____________________

Old
age
seems
in
some
cases
to
repeat
the
pattern
of
youth,
or
rather
to
bring
out
again
the
pattern,
which
was
blurred
during
the
active
years.
If
Dantiscus
was
a
kind
of
revenant,
stepping
into
the
place
of
Uncle
Lucas
–
was
not
Rheticus,
the
adventurer
and
firebrand,
in
some
respects
a
reincarnation
of
brother
Andreas?
Andreas
had
been
the
black
sheep
of
the
family,
Rheticus
was
a
heretic;
Andreas
was
a
leper,
Rheticus
was
a
sodomite.
Their
recklessness
and
intrepidity
both
fascinated
and
frightened
the
timid
Canon;
and
this
ambivalent
attitude
may
explain
his
betrayal
of
both.

Johannes
Flachsbinder,
destined
to
become
the
bane
of
Canon
Koppernigk's
old
age,
was
the
son
of
a
brewer
in
Danzig,
hence
the
name,
Dantiscus.
By
the
age
of
twenty,
he
had
fought
in
campaigns
against
the
Turks
and
the
Tartars,
had
studied
at
the
University
in
Cracow,
travelled
in
Greece,
Italy,
Arabia,
and
the
Holy
Land.
On
his
return,
he
became
confidential
secretary
to
the
King
of
Poland,
and
at
the
age
of
twenty-three,
the
King's
special
envoy
to
various
Prussian
Diets.
It
was
in
that
period
that
he
first
became
acquainted
with
Canon
Koppernigk,
then
secretary
to
Bishop
Lucas
on
similar
missions.
But
their
orbits
soon
parted:
Copernicus
remained
in
Ermland
for
the
rest
of
his
life,
whereas
Dantiscus,
during
the
next
seventeen
years,
travelled
all
over
Europe
as
Polish
Ambassador
to
the
Emperors
Maximilian
and
Charles
V.
He
was
a
favourite
of
both
Emperors
as
well
as
of
his
own
King;
Maximilian
appointed
him
poet
laureate
and
made
him
a
knight,
Charles
gave
him
a
Spanish
title,
and
both
borrowed
him
occasionally
for
missions
of
their
own
–
as
Maximilian's
special
envoy
to
Venice,
and
Charles
V's
to
François
I
in
Paris.
Yet
this
son
of
a
beer
brewer
from
the
outskirts
of
the
civilized
world,
who
succeeded
in
highly
delicate
diplomatic
missions,
was
neither
a
snob
nor
even
particularly
ambitious.
At
the
age
of
forty-five,
at
the
height
of
his
career,
he
retired,
at
his
own
request,
to
his
provincial
land
of
birth,
and
spent
the
rest
of
his
life
there
–
first
as
Bishop
of
Kulm,
then
of
Ermland.

During
his
ambassadorial
years,
Dantiscus'
main
interests
had
been
poetry,
women
and
the
company
of
learned
men,
apparently
in
that
order.
His
correspondence,
of
Erasmian
dimensions,
extended
even
to
the
new
Continent
of
America
–
he
exchanged
letters
with
Cortez
in
Mexico.
His
amorous
relationships
were
equally
cosmopolitan,
ranging
from
his
Tyrolian
"Grinea",
in
Innsbruck,
to
Ysope
de
Galda
in
Toledo,
who
bore
him
a
beautiful
daughter.
His
celebrated
poem
ad
Grineam
was
a
charming
elegy
on
the
splendours
and
decline
of
virility,
but
he
was
equally
devoted
to
his
Toledan
paramour
and
their
daughter,
Dantisca;
he
sent
them,
after
his
return
to
Ermland,
a
regular
allowance
through
the
banking
houses
of
the
Fuggers
and
Welsers
in
Augsburg,
and
received
a
portrait
of
Dantisca
through
the
good
offices
of
the
Emperor's
Spanish
Ambassador.
He
remained
loyal
to
his
former
friends
and
mistresses
even
when
he
became
a
devout
Catholic;
and
his
warm
friendship
towards
Melanchton,
the
Lutheran
leader,
remained
equally
unaffected
by
his
conversion.
In
January
1533,
when
Dantiscus
was
already
a
Bishop
in
Kulm,
Melanchton
wrote
to
him,
across
the
front-lines,
as
it
were,
that
he
would
all
his
life
remain
in
Dantiscus'
debt;
and
he
added
that
more
than
Dantiscus'
brilliant
gifts,
he
admired
his
profound
humanity.
⁷⁵
Another
contemporary
summed
up
the
general
opinion
prevailing
among
Lutheran
scholars
on
the
Catholic
Bishop
of
Kulm:
Dantiscum
ipsam
humanitatem
esse
–
he
is
humanity.
⁷⁶
The
subsequent
conflict
between
Dantiscus
and
Copernicus
must
be
judged
against
this
background.