Galileo 1564 to 1642
Middle ages from the 5th to the 15th century so its pretty close.
It wasn’t a common occurrence to jail people for going against the state approved position?? Have you heard of the inquisition?
But you’re correct, jail records are hard to find for that time period.
In 1440, Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa theorized that the earth was not at the center of the Universe. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_of_Cusa#Science
In 1533, Copernicus’s theory was presented in lectures in Rome. Pope Clement VII and several cardinals attended and approved of it. Several bishops then begged Copernicus to publish his theory, and when the book came out it was dedicated to Pope Paul III.
And even Dante, who is always put in the staunch geocentric camp, only believed that the physical world centered on the Earth. He centered the spiritual—and far more important—world on God, as you can see in Dore’s engraving of the Empyrean. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Paradiso_Canto_31.jpg
Did any of these people get in trouble with the Church for their views? No.
The trouble only started happening after the Reformation. On the Protestant side, Luther, Melancthon, and Calvin all opposed the Copernican theory. And on the Catholic side, Copernicus was only finally put on the Index of Forbidden Books in 1621, shortly before Galileo was tried in 1633.
Medieval Christians were actually far more open-minded about the theory than those of the so-called “enlightened” period of the Reformation.
