For the BBC executive, see Mary Somerville (broadcasting executive). For the American librarian, see Mary R. Somerville.
Mary Somerville
Painting by Thomas Phillips, 1834
Born
Mary Fairfax
(1780-12-26)26 December 1780
Jedburgh, Scotland
Died
29 November 1872(1872-11-29) (aged 91)
Naples, Italy
Resting place
English Cemetery, Naples
Awards
Patron's Medal (1869)
Scientific career
Fields
Science writing
Mathematics
Mary Somerville (/ˈsʌmərvɪl/; née Fairfax, formerly Greig; 26 December 1780 – 29 November 1872)[1] was a Scottish scientist, writer, and polymath. She studied mathematics and astronomy, and in 1835 she and Caroline Herschel were elected as the first female Honorary Members of the Royal Astronomical Society.
When John Stuart Mill organized a massive petition to Parliament to give women the right to vote, he made sure that the first signature on the petition would be Somerville's.
When she died in 1872, The Morning Post declared in her obituary that "Whatever difficulty we might experience in the middle of the nineteenth century in choosing a king of science, there could be no question whatever as to the queen of science".[2][3] One of the earliest uses of the word scientist was in a review by William Whewell of Somerville's second book On the Connexion of the Physical Sciences.[4] However, the word was not used to describe Somerville herself; she was known and celebrated as a mathematician or a philosopher.[5]
Somerville College, a college of the University of Oxford, is named after her, reflecting the virtues of liberalism and academic success that the college wished to embody.[6] She is featured on the front of the Royal Bank of Scotland polymer £10 note launched in 2017 along with a quotation from her work On the Connection of the Physical Sciences.[7]
^Boreham, Ruth (8 March 2017). "Mary Somerville: Queen of Science". Dangerous Women. Retrieved 12 July 2018.
^"Mrs. Somerville (Obituary)". The Morning Post from London. 2 December 1872.
^"Whewell, William". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/29200. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
^Secord, James (1 January 2018). "Mary Somerville's vision of science". Physics Today. 71 (1): 46–52. Bibcode:2018PhT....71a..46S. doi:10.1063/PT.3.3817. ISSN 0031-9228.
^Batson 2008, p. 23.
^"Royal Bank of Scotland – £10 Polymer". www.scotbanks.org.uk. Archived from the original on 18 April 2019. Retrieved 19 August 2019.
MarySomerville (/ˈsʌmərvɪl/; née Fairfax, formerly Greig; 26 December 1780 – 29 November 1872) was a Scottish scientist, writer, and polymath. She studied...
Saturday night soirées with their mutual friend, and Ada's private tutor, MarySomerville. Between 1842 and 1843, Ada translated an article by the military engineer...
Lectureship, awarded by the Royal Astronomical Society, as well as the 2020 MarySomerville Medal and Prize, awarded by the Institute of Physics. In 2022, she...
"distinguished contributions to public engagement within physics." The MarySomerville Medal and Prize The Isaac Newton Medal and Prize is a gold medal awarded...
Somerville College Library is the college library of Somerville College, one of the 38 colleges of the University of Oxford. The library is one of the...
On the Connexion of the Physical Sciences, by MarySomerville, is one of the best-selling science books of the 19th century. The book went through many...
scientific writer, MarySomerville (1780–1872), though the school's official name is still Brisbane High School for Girls. Today, Somerville House is owned...
Scottish Gaelic poet Sorley MacLean. The obverse of the £10 note shows MarySomerville, with a quote from her work 'The Connection of the Physical Sciences'...
physician William Somerville (1771–1860) and his wife and cousin, the polymath MarySomerville (1780–1872). Thomas Somerville, 1st Lord Somerville (c. 1370–1444)...
but also well-educated, there was growing demand for science titles. MarySomerville became an early and highly successful science writer of the nineteenth...
Outsiders (2016–2017). Somerville was born in Iowa City, Iowa, to Lefa Mary (née Pash; 1918–2011) and the Rev. Paul Somerville (1919-1995), who moved...
Choice’ by Sorley MacLean. The obverse of the £10 note shows scientist MarySomerville, with a quote from her work The Connection of the Physical Sciences...
Christmas Candle Bea Haddington 2014 Maleficent Flittle 2014 Mr. Turner MarySomerville 2015 Molly Moon and the Incredible Book of Hypnotism Miss Adderstone...
on the predecessors to Albert Einstein, on Émilie du Châtelet and MarySomerville, and on Thomas Harriot. In the 1970s, Arianrhod left her honours program...
Flagstaff, Arizona. The asteroid was named for Scottish polymath MarySomerville. Somerville is a member of the Lixiaohua family, an outer-belt asteroid family...
rank previously held only by three other women, Caroline Herschel and MarySomerville (in 1835), and Anne Sheepshanks (in 1862). She died of pneumonia in...
it first appeared in print in Whewell's anonymous 1834 review of MarySomerville's On the Connexion of the Physical Sciences published in the Quarterly...
named an honorary Member of the Royal Astronomical Society (1835, with MarySomerville). She was named an honorary member of the Royal Irish Academy (1838)...
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