Carlos de Sigüenza y Góngora (1645–1700)

The comet of 1680 frightened Mexico, and the royal cosmographer printed a pamphlet arguing that it portended nothing. Three men answered him in print; one was the Jesuit Eusebio Francisco Kino. His reply, the Libra astronómica, lay in a friend's chest for eight years and was printed in 1690 at that friend's expense. The same man read Mexican painted books as astronomical records, and foretold that his work on them would be buried with him.