Theodor Brorsen

Theodor Johan Christian Ambders Brorsen (July 29, 1819 – March 31, 1895) was a Danish astronomer. He is best known for his discovery of five comets, including the lost periodic comet, 5D/Brorsen, and the periodic comet 23P/Brorsen-Metcalf.

Theodor Johan Christian Ambders Brorsen was born in Nordborg on the island Als, (South Jutland), as son of the captain Christian August Brorsen (1793-1840) and Annette Margrethe Gerhardine Schumacher (1788-1855). He got his three middle names after the maternal grandfather of his mother, the Nordborg counsel Johan Christian Ambders (1710-1795). After the amicable divorce of his parents in 1822, Brorsen grew up at his mother’s. Her good financial circumstances allowed him to attend the school of the Moravians in Christiansfeld (1826-1829) and then, from 1830 to 1839, the Latin school in Flensburg. By request of his mother, Brorsen studied law in Kiel (1839), Berlin (1840), Heidelberg (1841), and again in Kiel (1842), until he decided to follow his inclinations and studied astronomy in Kiel in 1844.

Brorsen worked at the astronomical observatory of Kiel in 1846, and of Altona, Hamburg in 1847. He rejected a job offer from the astronomical oberservatory "Rundetaarn" (Round tower) in Copenhagen. Instead, he accepted a job at the private observatory of baron John Parish (1774-1858, an Englishman, also known as Freiherr von Senftenberg) in Žamberk (at the time called Senftenberg) in the present-day Czech Republic. When the post of the director of the astronomical observatory of Altona became vacant in 1854, Brorsen applied to it, but was not chosen. After the death of baron Parish in 1858, his heirs had the observatory of Senftenberg dismantled and the astronomical instruments were sold, although Brorsen offered to continue his work for free. Nevertheless. Brorsen remained in Senftenberg for another 12 years, and continued his observations with his own instruments.

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