Vernier, Pierre (1584-1638)

French engineer and instrumentmaker who invented a means of making very precise measurements with what is now called the vernier scale. Vernier was born in Ornans, near Besançon. He was working as a military engineer for the Spanish Habsburgs, then the rulers of Franche-Comté, when he realized the need for a more accurate way of reading angles on the surveying instruments he used in mapmaking. In 1630 he was appointed to the service of the count of Burgundy, for whom he built fortifications. In 1631 Vernier published La construction, l'usage, et les propriétez du quadrant nouveau mathématique/The construction, uses and properties of a new mathematical quadrant, in which he explained his method.