The telescope was invented at the beginning of the 17th century in the Netherlands, but the use of it for astronomical observations was popularised by Galileo (1564–1642) through the publishing of Sidereus Nuncius in 1610. This short book showed the reader mountains in the Moon, faint stars that formed the Milky Way and four natural satellites of Jupiter.

In the eighteenth and at the beginning of the nineteenth centuries astronomy actually consisted in the studies of motions of celestial bodies from the Solar System and creating more and more accurate and extensive catalogues of stars.

Today’s image of the universe and knowledge of its components owe a great deal to quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity, the two fundamental physical theories that were formulated early in the twentieth century.

The contribution of Polish scholars to the understanding of the nature of the Universe is not limited only to the achievements of minds of such stature as Nicolaus Copernicus. In the 13th century two scholars of the European caliber lived and created, who came from Silesia, but were educated in foreign institutions.