Mary Somerville
(1780-1872), Scientific scholar and writerEarly Victorian Portraits Catalogue Entry
Sitter in 5 portraits
Born to parents who did not believe in education for daughters; Somerville was principally self-taught. Her first husband, Samuel Greig, was hostile to her intellectualism. After his death she went on to study mathematics and was encouraged in her studies by her second husband, the surgeon William Somerville, whom she married in 1812. Her paper on the violet rays of the solar spectrum (1826) and her edition of Laplace's La mécanique céleste brought her much acclaim and she was elected as an honorary member of the Royal Astronomical Society. Major works in the fields of mathematics and science followed including, the immensely successful On the Connection of the Physical Sciences (1834).
by Sir Francis Leggatt Chantrey
pencil, 1832
NPG 316a(114)
by Sir Francis Leggatt Chantrey
pencil, 1832
NPG 316a(115)
by Pierre-Jean David D'Angers
bronze medallion, 1833
NPG 5379
by James Rannie Swinton
chalk, 1848
NPG 690
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