Monument in honor of Leonty Magnitsky in the city Ostashkov

Leonty Filippovich Magnitsky (russian: Леонтий Филиппович Магницкий), born Telyatin (russian: Телятин; June 9, 1669, in Ostashkov – October 19, 1739, in

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

) was a Russian

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History On ...

and

educator A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. whe ...

Biography

Magnitsky was born into a peasant family. According to some accounts, he graduated from the

Slavic Greek Latin Academy The Slavic Greek Latin Academy (russian: Славяно-греко-латинская академия) was the first higher education establishment in Moscow. History Beginning The academy's establishment may be viewed as a result of the incorpo ...

in Moscow. From 1701 and until his death, he taught

arithmetic Arithmetic () is an elementary part of mathematics that consists of the study of the properties of the traditional operations on numbers— addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, exponentiation, and extraction of roots. In the 19th ...

geometry Geometry (; ) is, with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. It is concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. A mathematician who works in the field of geometry is c ...

and

trigonometry Trigonometry () is a branch of mathematics that studies relationships between side lengths and angles of triangles. The field emerged in the Hellenistic world during the 3rd century BC from applications of geometry to astronomical studies. T ...

at the

Moscow School of Mathematics and Navigation Moscow School of Mathematics and Navigation () was a Russian educational institution founded by Peter the Great in 1701. Situated in the Sukharev Tower, it provided Russians with technical education for the first time and much of its curriculum w ...

, becoming its director in 1716. In 1703, Magnitsky wrote his famous ''

Arithmetic Arithmetic () is an elementary part of mathematics that consists of the study of the properties of the traditional operations on numbers— addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, exponentiation, and extraction of roots. In the 19th ...

'' (Арифметика; 2,400 copies), which was used as the principal textbook on mathematics in Russia until the middle of the 18th century.

Mikhail Lomonosov Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov (; russian: Михаил (Михайло) Васильевич Ломоносов, p=mʲɪxɐˈil vɐˈsʲilʲjɪvʲɪtɕ , a=Ru-Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov.ogg; – ) was a Russian Empire, Russian polymath, s ...

was himself taught by this book, which he called the "gates to his own erudition".. In 1703, Magnitsky also produced a Russian edition of Adriaan Vlacq's log tables called ''Таблицы логарифмов и синусов, тангенсов и секансов'' (Tables of

logarithm In mathematics, the logarithm is the inverse function to exponentiation. That means the logarithm of a number to the base is the exponent to which must be raised, to produce . For example, since , the ''logarithm base'' 10 o ...

sine In mathematics, sine and cosine are trigonometric functions of an angle. The sine and cosine of an acute angle are defined in the context of a right triangle: for the specified angle, its sine is the ratio of the length of the side that is oppo ...

tangent In geometry, the tangent line (or simply tangent) to a plane curve at a given point is the straight line that "just touches" the curve at that point. Leibniz defined it as the line through a pair of infinitely close points on the curve. More ...

s, and secants). Legend has it that Leonty Magnitsky was nicknamed ''Magnitsky'' by

Peter the Great Peter I ( – ), most commonly known as Peter the Great,) or Pyotr Alekséyevich ( rus, Пётр Алексе́евич, p=ˈpʲɵtr ɐlʲɪˈksʲejɪvʲɪtɕ, , group=pron was a Russian monarch who ruled the Tsardom of Russia from t ...

, who considered him a "people's

magnet A magnet is a material or object that produces a magnetic field. This magnetic field is invisible but is responsible for the most notable property of a magnet: a force that pulls on other ferromagnetic materials, such as iron, steel, nickel, ...

" (магнит, or "magnit" in Russian). For his educatorial achievements he was ennobled in 1704, and was given numerous awards and gifts by the Tsar.

References

1669 births 1739 deaths Russian educators 18th-century mathematicians from the Russian Empire People from Ostashkovsky District Russian scientists {{Russia-mathematician-stub