Somerville

Mary Fairfax Greig Somerville

Born: 26 Dec 1780 in Jedburgh, Roxburghshire, Scotland
Died: 29 Nov 1872 in Naples, Italy

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Mary Somerville studied Euclid with the help of her younger brother's tutor. She married at the age of 24 but her husband died 3 years later. After this she won a prize from a mathematical journal. Married again at the age of 32, she lived in London and often visited Paris, meeting many scientists.

She published papers in physics and is famous for her translation of Laplace's Méchanique Céleste published in 1831. Most of the rest of her life was spent in Italy where she wrote many works which influenced Maxwell. Her discussion of a hypothetical planet perturbing Uranus led Adams to his investigation.

Somerville also published a treatise on Finite Differences and various other books on 'popular science'. Somerville College in Oxford was named after her.

Other Web sites:

Agnes Scott College, USA

References:

  1. Dictionary of Scientific Biography
  2. E C Patterson, Mary Somerville, British Journal for the History of Science 4 (1969), 311-339.
  3. Martha Somerville, Personal Recollections from Early Life to Old Age of Mary Somerville (London, 1873).
  4. E C Patterson, Mary Somerville and the cultivation of science, 1815-1840 (Boston, 1983).
  5. L S Grinstein and P J Campbell (eds.), Women of Mathematics (Westport, Conn., 1987), 208-217. 
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JOC/EFR February 1996