Royal Society - Council Minutes of the Royal Society 6

Peter Ball or Balle, M.D. (died 1675), was an English

physician A physician, medical practitioner (British English), medical doctor, or simply doctor is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through the Medical education, study, Med ...

. Ball was the third son of Sir Peter Ball of

Mamhead Mamhead is a rural village and civil parish near Dawlish and Kenton, Devon, Kenton in Devon, South West England, in the Teignbridge local authority area. Current community venues includMamhead Village Halland The Church of England parish church ...

Devon and his wife Anne Cooke, daughter of William Cooke. In 1652 he was admitted to the Middle Temple, London and called to the bar in 1657. Peter was entered as a medical student at

Leyden Leiden ( ; ; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 127,046 (31 January 2023), but the city forms one densely connecte ...

on 13 January 1659, at the age of 20, but went on to

Padua Padua ( ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) in Veneto, northern Italy, and the capital of the province of Padua. The city lies on the banks of the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice and southeast of Vicenza, and has a population of 20 ...

, where he took the degree of doctor of philosophy and physic with the highest distinction on 30 December 1660. To celebrate the occasion verses in Latin, Italian, and English were published at Padua, in which Ball, by a somewhat violent twist of his Latinised names, Petrus Bule, is made to figure as 'alter Phœbus.' Ball was admitted an honorary fellow of the

Royal College of Physicians The Royal College of Physicians of London, commonly referred to simply as the Royal College of Physicians (RCP), is a British professional membership body dedicated to improving the practice of medicine, chiefly through the accreditation of ph ...

in December 1664. He was one of the original fellows of the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

, one of the council in 1666, and in the following year was placed on the committee to organise the cataloguing of the library and manuscripts of

Arundel House Arundel House was a London town-house located between the Strand and the River Thames, near the Church of St Clement Danes. History During the Middle Ages, it was the London residence of the Bishops of Bath and Wells, when it was known ...

, which had been presented to the society by Henry Howard, Esq., afterwards Duke of Norfolk. While at Mamhead in October 1665, Ball and his elder brother

William William is a masculine given name of Germanic languages, Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman Conquest, Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle ...

observed the

Rings of Saturn Saturn has the most extensive and complex ring system of any planet in the Solar System. The rings consist of particles in orbit around the planet made almost entirely of water ice, with a trace component of Rock (geology), rocky material. Parti ...

as a band (or "fascia") upon the planet when they had apparently disappeared from being seen edge-on from Earth. Ball died in July 1675 and was buried on 20 July in

Temple Church The Temple Church, a royal peculiar in the Church of England, is a church in the Inner Temple, Inner and Middle Temple, Middle Temple, London, Temples located between Fleet Street and the River Thames, built by the Knights Templar for their En ...

References

* ;Attribution

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ball, Peter Year of birth missing 1675 deaths 17th-century English medical doctors Original fellows of the Royal Society Fellows of the Royal College of Physicians