Mathematicians Of The Day
15th March
On this day in 1590, François Viète cracked the code of a message from Philip II of Spain and sent it to Henry IV of France.
... when Philip, assuming that the cipher could not be broken, discovered that the French were aware of his military plans, he complained to the Pope that black magic was being employed against his country.
Click on Ⓟ for a poster.
Born:
- 1713: Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille Ⓟ
- 1855: Charles Boys Ⓟ
- 1860: Raphael Weldon Ⓟ
- 1868: Grace Chisholm Ⓟ
- 1890: Boris Nikolaevich Delone Ⓟ
- 1924: Aldo Andreotti Ⓟ
- 1940: Jacob Palis Jr Ⓟ
Died:
- 1897: James Joseph Sylvester Ⓟ
- 1900: Elwin Christoffel Ⓟ
- 1912: Cesare Arzelà Ⓟ
- 1941: George Lawson Ⓟ
- 1952: Ernst Julius Amberg Ⓟ
- 1960: Eduard Čech Ⓟ
- 1992: Deane Montgomery Ⓟ
- 1994: Erling Sverdrup Ⓟ
- 2004: John Pople Ⓟ
- 2006: George Mackey Ⓟ
Quotation of the day
From James Joseph Sylvester
The early study of Euclid made me a hater of geometry.