NUNES, PEDRO

born 1502, Alccer do Sal, Port. died Aug. 11, 1578, Coimbra Latin Petrus Nonius mathematician, geographer, and the chief figure in Portuguese nautical science, noted for his studies of the Earth, including the oceans. Nunes was professor of mathematics at Lisbon and Coimbra and became royal cosmographer in 1529, when Spain was disputing the position of the Spice Islands and maps did not agree in their longitude. He devoted himself to such problems as well as to maps and map projections. He went to Spain in 1538 but returned to Portugal in 1544 to become a leading authority on the new discoveries of Spain and Portugal.