Grosseteste

Robert Grosseteste

Born: 1168 in Suffolk, England
Died: 9 Oct 1253 in Buckden, Buckinghamshire, England

Previous (Chronologically) Next     Biographies Index

Previous ( Alphabetically) Next          Welcome page
Grosseteste was Chancellor of Oxford University from 1215 to 1221 and Bishop of Lincoln from 1235. He worked on geometry, optics and astronomy. Grosseteste realised that the hypothetical space in which Euclid imagined his figures was the same everywhere and in every direction. He then postulated that this was true of the propagation of light.

Grosseteste also made Latin translations of many Greek and Arabic scientific writings. He wrote a commentary on Aristotle's Posterior Analytics and Physics and many treatises on scientific subjects. Roger Bacon was his student.

References:

  1. Dictionary of Scientific Biography
  2. Biography in Encyclopaedia Britannica
  3. A C Crombie, Robert Grosseteste and the Origins of Experimental Science 1100-1700 (Oxford, 1971).
  4. R C Dales, The computistical works ascribed to Robert Grosseteste, Isis 80 (1989), 74-79. 
Previous (Chronologically) Next     Biographies Index

Previous ( Alphabetically) Next          Welcome page

History Topics Index              Famous curves index

Chronologies                           Birthplace Map

Mathematicians of the day  Anniversaries for the year

Search Form   Simple Search Form   Search Suggestions
JOC/EFR February 1996