Sir Henry Billingsley (died 22 November 1606) was an English merchant,
Lord Mayor of London
The Lord Mayor of London is the mayor of the City of London and the leader of the City of London Corporation. Within the City, the Lord Mayor is accorded precedence over all individuals except the sovereign and retains various traditional pow ...
and the first translator of
Euclid
Euclid (; grc-gre, Εὐκλείδης; BC) was an ancient Greek mathematician active as a geometer and logician. Considered the "father of geometry", he is chiefly known for the '' Elements'' treatise, which established the foundations of ...
into English.
Early life
He was a son of Sir William Billingsley, haberdasher and assay master of London, and his wife, Elizabeth Harlowe. He entered
St. John's College, Cambridge
St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge founded by the Tudor matriarch Lady Margaret Beaufort. In constitutional terms, the college is a charitable corporation established by a charter dated 9 April 1511. The ...
, in 1551, and also studied at
Oxford
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
, where, under the tutelage of
David Whytehead, he developed an interest in mathematics. His father died in 1553, and in the next year, his mother remarried to Sir
Martin Bowes. He did not take a degree but was apprenticed to a London merchant. He became a freeman of the
Worshipful Company of Haberdashers by patrimony in 1560.
Career
Billingsley prospered as a merchant. He was chosen
sheriff of London in 1584 and
alderman
An alderman is a member of a municipal assembly or council in many jurisdictions founded upon English law. The term may be titular, denoting a high-ranking member of a borough or county council, a council member chosen by the elected members t ...
of
Tower Ward in 1585. He became one of
Elizabeth's four customs collectors in 1589. In 1596, he succeeded Sir
Thomas Skinner as Lord Mayor of London, and was knighted in the following year. In 1603, he sat in Parliament for
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
. He founded three scholarships for poor students at St. John's College and served as President of
St Thomas' Hospital. Although in the introduction to his ''Euclid'', he proposed to undertake other translations, he never did so.
Translation of Euclid
In 1570, Billingsley published his translation of
Euclid's Elements
The ''Elements'' ( grc, Στοιχεῖα ''Stoikheîa'') is a mathematical treatise consisting of 13 books attributed to the ancient Greek mathematician Euclid in Alexandria, Ptolemaic Egypt 300 BC. It is a collection of definitions, postulat ...
''The elements of geometrie of the most ancient philosopher
Euclide of Megara''. (Actually, it should have been Euclid of Alexandria; the two Euclids were frequently confused in the Renaissance.) The work included a lengthy preface by
John Dee, which surveyed all the existing branches of pure and applied mathematics. Dee also provided copious notes and other supplementary material. The work was printed in folio by
John Day, and included several three-dimensional fold-up diagrams illustrating solid geometry. Though not the very first, it was one of the first books to include such a feature.
The translation, renowned for its clarity and accuracy, was made from Greek rather than the well-known Latin translation of
Campanus.
Augustus De Morgan has suggested that the translation was solely the work of Dee, but in his correspondence, Dee states specifically that only the introduction and the supplementary material were his.
Anthony Wood asserted that the translation was largely the work of Whytehead, who spent his final years at Billingsley's house. This story passed from Robert Barnes in Oxford to
Thomas Allen; and from Allen to
Brian Twyne.
Whytehead did apparently provide some assistance, but there is no evidence that the work is all his; Wood frequently reported gossip as fact. Billingsley's copy of Euclid found its way to
Princeton College
Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ni ...
and Halsted described it, putting to rest the claims that the translation had been made from the Latin and that it was not Billingsley's own work.
Family
By the remarriages of his mother after his father's death, Henry Billingsley became the stepson successively of Sir
Martin Bowes (died 1567), and then of
Thomas Seckford, Esquire (died 1587).
[Will of Thomas Seckforde or Sackforde, Ordinary Master of the Requests to Her Majesty of Woodbridge, Suffolk (P.C.C. 1588, Rutland quire); Sentence of Thomas Seckforde or Seckford of Ipswich, Suffolk (P.C.C. 1590, Drury quire).] His mother died in 1586.
He married five times and had at least ten children. The majority of his children were born to his first marriage to Elizabeth Bourne (died July 1577). His third wife Katherine Killigrew (died 1598) came from the prominent
Cornish family whose seat was at
Arwenack
Arwenack, historically in the parish of St Budock, Cornwall, is a historic manor on the site of what is today the town of Falmouth. It was partly destroyed in 1646, and only a remnant survives today. It was long held by the Killigrew family, w ...
near
Falmouth.
He purchased, with his son Henry,
Siston Court,
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean.
The county town is the city of Gl ...
c.1598 from Arthur Player of
Westerleigh, who had acquired it in 1595. His daughter Elizabeth married the cloth merchant, Sir John Quarles (not to be confused with the later poet
John Quarles
John Quarles (1624 or 1625–1665) was an English poet.
Life
One of the eighteen children of Francis Quarles, Quarles may have been born in Essex in 1624. He was educated under the care of Archbishop James Ussher. Quarles matriculated at Exeter ...
).
References
Bibliography
*
* Diana M. Simpkins "Early editions of Euclid in England", ''Annals of Science'', Volume 22, Number 4, December 1966.
*
George Bruce Halsted
George Bruce Halsted (November 25, 1853 – March 16, 1922), usually cited as G. B. Halsted, was an American mathematician who explored foundations of geometry and introduced non-Euclidean geometry into the United States through his own work and ...
, "Note on the First English Euclid", ''American Journal of Mathematics'', Vol. 2, No. 1. (Mar., 1879), pp. 46–48.
External links
Several pictures of a copy of Billingsley's Euclid*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Billingsley, Henry
16th-century births
Year of birth unknown
1606 deaths
English merchants
Greek–English translators
16th-century English translators
Sheriffs of the City of London
16th-century lord mayors of London
English MPs 1604–1611
Members of the Parliament of England for the City of London
Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge