ALBERT OF SAXONY (ALBERT OF HELMSTEDT, Albertutius, Albertus parvus). - A philosopher and cultivator of the natural sciences of the second half of the 14th century. Died in 1390. He studied at the University of Paris, taught there from 1351, and became its rector in 1353. After the founding of the University of Vienna in 1365, he was its first rector until 1366, when he was elected Bishop of Halberstadt.
His works are numerous and varied: *Tractatus logicae*; *Sophismata*; *Quaestiones in logicam Guil. Occam*; *In Post. Analyst*; *Quaestiones super octo Physicorum libros*; *In libros de coelo et mundo*; *De generatione et corruptione*; *Expositio decem librorum Ethicorum Aristotelis*; *De sensu et de sensato*; *Tractatus de proportionibus*, etc.
Although Albert’s philosophical and scientific importance is not of the first rank, as he generally follows the doctrines of his predecessors and teachers, nonetheless, through his many works which were widely read, cited, transcribed, and later printed several times, he contributed significantly to the fervor of research, especially in the field of *physica*, which constitutes the hallmark of the terminist school of the 14th century and anticipates some of the great discoveries of the 16th century in mechanics and celestial physics. A faithful disciple of Ockham in logic, in the natural sciences he chiefly follows his master John Buridan (v.), from whom he takes, among other things, the theory of *impetus* with its various applications, though introducing the discordant views of Nicole Oresme. Notable also are his investigations and hypotheses (again dependent on Nicole Oresme) on the mathematical laws of accelerated motion—particularly of falling bodies—in relation to time and distance traveled. Also noteworthy are his somewhat original views on the center of gravity, which he places at the center of the world: toward this point the center of gravity of the earth naturally tends, just as the center of gravity of bodies tends toward the center of the earth. Albert also enunciates, drawing it from “one of his teachers,” the hypothesis—by no means forgotten in the Middle Ages—of the motion of the earth and the immobility of the heavens.