Tycho Brahe Needs To Use The Bathroom

Tycho Brahe Needs To Use The Bathroom

The following is based on a true story

“To life!” bellowed the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II.

What this statement, the corpulent, hirsute monarch raised his beer stein and drank.  Seated at the far end of the table, Tycho Brahe and Johannes Kepler duly raised their glasses and drank as well.  At this moment — October 13, 1601 — the duo were the most accomplished astronomers in human history.  They were at the party at the king’s request, and since Tycho’s entire livelihood depended on Rudolph’s patronage, invitations were not to be refused.

Tycho and Kepler had arrived at the party promptly at 6:30.  Brahe noted that only about half of the 100 guests had arrived, and frowned with disapproval.  Brahe was relentlessly punctual; tardiness was a sign of disrespect.  The dining room was decorated lavishly, as one would expect.  The walls were lined with oil paintings; light was provided by elegant diamond chandeliers; in the corner lay a small fountain, lined with gold statues of cherubic children emitting streams of water from their mouths. 

Rudolph was naturally seated at the head of the table.  Brahe and Kepler were seated next to each other on the far end of the table, which held fifty to a side.  Each guest had a beer stein in front of them, but no food had been brought out.  Within a few minutes, the rest of the guests had arrived, and Rudolph lifted his stein again.  Brahe and Kepler, ever conscious of their manners, drank whenever the king did.  

Tycho’s mind began to wander back to his work.  His view of the scientific method had been crystallized years prior: “people clamor for inspiration, but all they really need is precision.”  This simple, utilitarian statement was the essence of his philosophy.  Genius was the product of hard work, not inspiration.  Tycho’s contribution to human history was invaluable, but it was not the product of a creative genius.  Tycho did something that other people had already done (namely, track the motion of the stars) and did it more diligently and with more precision than ever before.  This is not to say that Brahe was not gifted.  He was well-educated in a variety of subjects, and known to be an insightful thinker.  More than anything, however, Brahe achieved immortality through painstaking dedication to his craft.  His accomplishments were well within reach of any number of people, had they been as fastidiously motivated as Brahe.  The fact of the matter, however, was that they were not.

Tycho’s emphasis on precision did not win him many friends.  His employees found him exacting, and unreasonably demanding; his benefactors found him stubborn and unreasonably demanding; his family found him distant, and unreasonably demanding.  Originally, Brahe was from Denmark but, after a long line of disagreements with numerous people capable of making his life miserable, he found it necessary to flee to Prague for the protection of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II.  

Of the many people who found it difficult get along with Brahe, one of the most notable was the guy who shot off his nose.  The incident had started as a typical intellectual disagreement.  Brahe had insisted, as usual, that the planets orbited the sun, while the sun orbited the Earth.  The other man had insisted, to the contrary, that British women were more beautiful than Danish women.  Both men found these two ideas philosophically incompatible.  Following a protracted series of arguments, the men decided that the only way to settle the disagreement was with a duel.  While both men survived the duel, Brahe’s nose was seriously damaged and had to be amputated.  Brahe replaced his original nose with a prosthetic.  Contrary to later claims that the nose was gold or silver — and thus a status symbol, albeit an odd one — it was nothing more than a lump of bronze, and not at all a fashionable accessory. Even as far back as the 17th century, when the definition of beauty was far different than it is now, noselessness was considered a physically unappealing trait.

That morning, Tycho had risen at two am, just like every other day, despite it being a Saturday.  With the help of his young assistant Johannes Kepler, he studiously took notes on the positions of the stars.  This tedious work formed the basis for Brahe’s star catalogue.  Tycho, using a variety of arcane instruments of his own design, took readings of the stars and reported them to Kepler, while Kepler recorded the numbers.  Later on, after the sun came up, new numbers would be added to the ledger, derived from the measurements taken that night with the assistance of a table of trigonometric functions that Brahe used to approximate what logarithms would be used for in later centuries.  When completed, the star catalogue would be the most accurate and comprehensive in history.   

After Brahe and Kepler finished their work, Tycho retired for a nap.  Rudolph’s parties were notoriously extravagant and lengthy, and Tycho wanted to make sure that he had the energy to survive it.  Tycho usually avoided lavish engagements, but the king had personally requested that Tycho attend, and to decline the invitation would be exceedingly rude.  Thus,Tycho and Kepler now found themselves getting hammered with the Holy Roman Emperor.

“Drink!” Rudolph yelled again, “to our health, and the health of the Holy Roman Empire!”

The guests duly raised their mugs and guzzled the beer.  Tycho took a small sip, but Kepler egged him on.

“Drink more than that,” he said quietly, while nudging Brahe, “it’s considered rude to drink less than the emperor.  It stems from an old superstition that men who remained sober around the king were waiting for him to get drunk so they could assassinate him.”

“I see,” Tycho said.

He lifted the stein and chugged down the rest of his beer.  At the other end of the table, the king was getting more boisterous.

“More beer,” he yelled to his servants, “and then the first course!”

The servants ran around and filled everyone’s mugs up.  Kepler and Brahe lifted theirs up in the king’s direction and drank again.  The first course was a salad made from vegetables from the king’s personal garden, including a recent crop of water chestnuts.  The servants laid the salad down along with a glass of wine, taking care to keep everyone’s beer steins full, an instruction about which the king had been quite emphatic.  Brahe ate his salad, while he and Kepler engaged in their ongoing debate about the structure of the heavens.

“You must abandon your haphazard model, and fully embrace the heliocentric model,” Kepler told him for the 1000th time.  “It is the only way to accurately predict the motion of the stars.”

“Nonsense.  A heliocentric model is entirely unnecessary, and blasphemous.  I admit that the planets orbit the sun, but not that the Earth does.”

Kepler and Brahe continued their discussion throughout the first course.  The servants brought the next course out.  It was a braised lamb, this time accompanied with a red wine.  The lamb was garnished with potatoes and served on the bone.  

“Another toast!” the king bellowed out again, “before we eat the next course.”

The dinner guests all raised their beers and chugged them down again.  

“I probably should have used the bathroom before I came,” Tycho said offhandedly, changing the subject.

“Oh, absolutely.  I spent an entire 15 minutes earlier in the day emptying my bladder profusely.  It’s a major faux paus to get up before the meal is over.”

Tycho was known for his assiduousness with regards to decorum, but, being from Denmark, he was not intimately familiar with all of the dinner rules in Prague.

“What?” he exclaimed.  “Are you insane?  I’ve had four beers already!”

The servants came by and placed the lamb course down.

“You’re just going to have to hold it,” Kepler told him matter-of-factly.

“How many courses are there?”

“Ten.”

Brahe’s heart sank.

“This is quite unfortunate.”

The lamb course was followed by a celebratory shot of vodka to cleanse the palette, before the cheese course.  When the cheese was brought out, Brahe grabbed a large chunk of bread and ate it with the cheese, thinking that perhaps the bread would soak up the beer in his stomach.  The cheese course went quickly, and the servants brought out the fourth course, which was a pasta dish.

“Perhaps if I just sneak out right now during the pasta no one will notice,” Tycho said to Kepler.

“Oh no,” Kepler responded, “the last time a man left during the pasta course, he was beaten rather savagely.”

Brahe frowned.

“You don’t say.”

The guests finished up their pasta, and the first desert was brought out for the fifth course to mark the halfway point of the meal.

“But first,” the king yelled out, pausing dramatically, “…another toast!”

Tycho lifted his glass up reluctantly and took a tentative sip.

“Tycho!” the king yelled from the other side of the room, “I see you!  Drink!  Drink and be merry!”

Singled out in this fashion, Tycho had no choice.  He lifted the mug up and finished his beer again.  An attendant dutifully filled it up when he sat it back down on the table.  Tycho shifted in his seat slightly and pressed his legs together.  The pain from his bladder nullified his intoxication, leaving him agonizingly sober.  The first dessert course was brought out.  It was a chocolate parfait.  Brahe lifted his spoon and tried to savor the ice cream to distract him from the urgency of his urinary problem.  Kepler was still talking about the planets.

“Why should God be forced to place man at the center of the universe?  Might He, in his wisdom, choose some other course of action, one which we cannot fully comprehend?  He might fill the heavens with other planets were He so inclined.  Beautiful planets, filled with endless oceans, roaring waterfalls, rivers, and endless array of streams spewing forth —“

Brahe cringed at the thought of this hypothetical paradise where liquids streamed forth unimpeded, and interrupted Kepler.

“He might, Johannes,” Brahe said testily, “but He hath not, and we know this because He has told us so in the good book.”

Kepler was skeptical, but before he could retort, it was time for the next course.  This time it was a seared chicken breast, topped with a raspberry glaze.  The servants placed the dish down in front of the dinner guests.

“Perhaps now I might leave?  Now that we have finished the fifth course?  The man you mentioned earlier was beaten during the fourth course, not during the sixth course.  Perhaps by the time the sixth course is brought out, a brief absence will be understandable.”  

“Oh, quite the opposite,” Kepler said regretfully.  “The last man who left during the sixth course had his face burned with a branding iron, and was whipped with a cat ‘o’ nine tails.”

“The punishment was worse for leaving later in the meal?!?” Brahe said incredulously.

“Oh, yes, the sixth course is very important to His Majesty.”

Tycho crossed his legs and leaned forward.  Fidgeting in his seat, Brahe ate as much of the chicken as he could.  The king’s chef was world reknowned and the chicken was, it must be said, delicious.  Kepler was still more concerned with heliocentrism.

“You, Tycho, a man with such an empirical worldview, must be willing to see the evidence for what it is.  Would that you would consider again the possibility that the Earth rotates the Sun.”

Tycho grabbed Kepler forcefully by the collar.

“I would consider that the Earth orbits the Moon and that the Sun orbits Copenhagen if someone would let me empty my bladder, Johannes!”

Kepler frowned.

“Well, you don’t have to be rude, Tycho.”

Tycho closed his eyes and visualized the relief he would feel later.  This moment would soon pass, followed by a glorious absence of pain, and it would be nothing more than a brief interregnum of discomfort relegated to the past.  Brahe only had to endure four more courses.  The King had something to say first, though.

“Before we indulge in the last four courses,” Rudolph said to the assembled guests.  “There is something important to discuss.”

The guests all turned to Rudolph and gave him their undivided attention.

“It has been brought to my attention that a large number of peasants of among the lower class have begun grumbling about decadence at my court.  It seems that rumors of lavish dinner parties have reached their ears.  I would like to remind you all — you, the privileged members of my court — that I consider your discretion an obligation.  It would seem, to the contrary, that someone among us has taken it upon themselves to leak details of some aspects of our life to the populace.  This leaker, or leakers, as it may be, have produced a steady stream of information about our lifestyle here at the castle.  This stream has flowed forth from the center of the kingdom here in Prague all over the Empire.  I am prepared to overlook this indiscretion for now, but I assure you, that if anyone has the urge to leak anything in the future, you would be wise to hold it in.”

With this Rudolph lifted his mug yet again, and the diners dutifully gulped down their beers.  The beer plummeted downwards from Brahe’s mouth into the cavernous lake of fluid filling his stomach with a plop.  A bolt of pain shivered down his leg.  The seventh course was brought out.  This time it was beef, accompanied with another red wine.  His mind unable to conceive of anything but relieving himself, Brahe chewed on the beef mindlessly and stared off into space.

The beef course was followed by another shot of vodka.  Brahe was by now both intoxicated and in agonizing pain.  He uncrossed his legs, and then promptly recrossed them.  

“How about some coffee before we eat the last three courses?” the king yelled out exuberantly.

“Oh please God no,” Brahe muttered helplessly to himself.

Coffee was brought out.  The sight of the diuretic liquid made Brahe queasy, but — sensitive as always to polite conduct in front of the king — he managed to drink the entire cup.  The eighth course was brought out.  This time it was a grilled fish.

“Let it be known, that these fish were all caught today,” Rudolph told his guest proudly.  “Just this morning all of these fish were swimming silently in streams, seemingly unwise to the fact that their seafaring life was soon to cease so that we could acquire sustenance from a succulent supper on Saturday night.”

Brahe’s bladder throbbed beneath him, and he cringed again.  The fish, lavishly prepared with a variety of spices, and garnished with potatoes and greens, tasted to Brahe like a rotted carcass.  He closed his eyes and choked the food down.  His legs were pressed together with so much force that later on Brahe would notice they had turned red on their inner half.

The second-to-last course was on its way.  It was a seared duck in an orange sauce.  

“What about leaving after the eighth course?  Surely the punishment is not severe for leaving so very late in the dinner.” Brahe said to Kepler pleadingly.

“Quite the opposite, my dear friend,” Kepler responded.  “The punishment for leaving during the ninth course is twofold: first the offender if kicked repeatedly in his saturated testicles with a pair of steel-toed boats.”

Brahe face turned to horror at the thought.

“Then, in a display of Rudolph’s lovely sense of irony, the victim is driven crazy via an exotic form of punishment known as the Chinese Water Torture.  A single drop of water is repeatedly dropped on the forehead of a restrained man, until he is driven completely insane.”

The duck was placed in front of the guests.  Brahe became fixated on the fountain in the corner.  Its subtle bubbling of water had gradually wormed its way into Brahe’s head, until it began to sound like a roaring waterfall, taunting Tycho with its uninterrupted flow of water.  With a good deal of effort, Brahe managed to eat the ninth course.  Just one more to go, and a measly desert course at that.

“I have a special surprise for you,” Rudolph informed the guests, “Our final desert is an exotic fruit I have had shipped in from Asia: namely, watermelon.”

Brahe looked at Kepler.

“There is no God.”

Kepler perked up.

“Does this mean you have accepted heliocentrism?”

“What?” Brahe said, completely oblivious to anything but his bladder.  “Oh, uh, yeah, sure whatever.”

The watermelon was placed on the table and the guests dug in enthusiastically.  Brahe managed to eat most of his, painfully.  Finally, at long last, the guests were done.  The servants came by and picked up the watermelon rinds.  A number of men lit cigars.  Tycho shot up from his chair and shuffled over to the nearest servant.

“Where are you bathroom facilities?” he implored.

“Go down this hallway,” the man said, pointing to his left.  “Take a right after the sixth doorway.  Then go another eight doors down and take a left, wait, no a right.  Yes, a right after the eighth doorway, no wait the ninth door, and, hold on, let me think.”

“GOOD GOD MAN SPIT IT OUT.” 

“Just one second, I always forget.”

Tycho shoved the man out of the way impatiently, and hopped down the hallway with his hands covering his pelvis.  He began throwing doors open randomly, looking for the facilities.  At long last, one of the doors swung open to reveal a bathroom.  Brahe stumbled inside and closed the door behind him.  He unzipped his trousers frantically and prepared himself for sweet relief. 

Then came nothing.

He stared down.  A couple of drops of urine fell out pathetically.  He screamed out in frustration and gritted his teeth.  He pounded on the wall violently.  With all his might Tyscho strained to force out the urine that tortured him.  He prayed to God that he be allowed to empty his bladder.  He yelled out to the heavens that he had studied so dutifully, but they had abandoned him.  Brahe then pleaded with his body.  He tried begging it; he tried reasoning with it; he tried bargaining with it, by offering his penis a trip to a brothel.  It was all no use: he had held it too long, and he was hopelessly backed up.  A week later he was dead of kidney failure.

“It gives me great relief to know that, in his final moments, he saw the correctness of heliocentrism,” Kepler is said to have remarked.