Thomas Stephens Davies FRS

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soci ...

(1795–1851) was a British

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 ...

Life

He was born on 1 January 1795. Davies made his earliest communications to the '' Leeds Correspondent'' in July 1817 and the ''

Gentleman's Diary ''Gentleman's Diary or The Mathematical Repository'' was (a supplement to) an almanac published at the end of the 18th century in England, including mathematical problems. The supplement was also known as: ''"The mathematical repository: an almana ...

'' for 1819. He subsequently contributed largely to the ''Gentleman's and Lady's Diary'', Clay's ''Scientific Receptacle'', the ''Monthly Magazine'', the ''

Philosophical Magazine The ''Philosophical Magazine'' is one of the oldest scientific journals published in English. It was established by Alexander Tilloch in 1798;John Burnett"Tilloch, Alexander (1759–1825)" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford Univer ...

'', the ''Bath and Bristol Magazine'', and the ''Mechanics' Magazine''. Davies was elected a

Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

, 19 March 1840 Davies's early acquaintance with Dr.

William Trail William Trail or Traill FRSE MRIA (23 June 1746 – 3 February 1831) was a Scots-born mathematician, remembered for his mathematical text books. For the majority of his life, he served church duties in Northern Ireland. Life Sources are un ...

, the author of the ''Life of Dr. Robert Simson'', materially influenced his course of study and made him familiar with the old as well as with the modern professors of

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 ...

. He became a

fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soci ...

in 1831, and he contributed several original and elaborate papers to its ''Transactions''. He also published ''Researches on Terrestrial Magnetism'' in the ''Philosophical Transactions'', ''Determination of the Law of Resistance to a Projectile'' in the ''Mechanics' Magazine'', and other papers in the ''Cambridge and Dublin Mathematical Journal'', the ''Civil Engineer'', the ''Athenæum'', the ''Westminster Review'', and ''Notes and Queries''. In 1831 he was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...

his proposer being

John Shoolbred John Shoolbred FRSE (13 March 1766 – 12 October 1831) was a Scottish naval surgeon. He is associated with the early widespread use of smallpox vaccine in India in the early 19th century. Life He was born in Auchtermuchty in Fife on 13 March 17 ...

. In April, 1833 he was elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...

. In 1834, he was appointed one of the mathematical masters in the Royal Military Academy at

Woolwich Woolwich () is a district in southeast London, England, within the Royal Borough of Greenwich. The district's location on the River Thames led to its status as an important naval, military and industrial area; a role that was maintained throu ...

. Among the numerous subjects that engaged his attention were researches on the properties of the trapezium,

Pascal Pascal, Pascal's or PASCAL may refer to: People and fictional characters * Pascal (given name), including a list of people with the name * Pascal (surname), including a list of people and fictional characters with the name ** Blaise Pascal, Fren ...

hexagram , can be seen as a compound composed of an upwards (blue here) and downwards (pink) facing equilateral triangle, with their intersection as a regular hexagon (in green). A hexagram ( Greek language, Greek) or sexagram (Latin) is a six-pointed ...

me mystique, Brianchon's theorem, symmetrical properties of plane triangles, and researches into the geometry of three dimensions. His new system of

spherical geometry 300px, A sphere with a spherical triangle on it. Spherical geometry is the geometry of the two-dimensional surface of a sphere. In this context the word "sphere" refers only to the 2-dimensional surface and other terms like "ball" or "solid sp ...

preserves his name in the list of well-known mathematicians. His presentation "On the Velocipede" in May 1837 is extant as a manuscript and gives a vivid testimony of the rise and putting down of the draisines aka hobby-horses. He must have been an early hobby-horse rider himself according to that (transcript in ''The Boneshaker'' #108(1985) pp. 4–9 and #111(1986) pp. 7–12)) His death, after six years of illness, took place at Broomhall Cottage,

Shooter's Hill Shooter's Hill (or Shooters Hill) is a district in South East London within the Royal Borough of Greenwich. It borders the London Borough of Bexley. It lies north of Eltham and south of Woolwich. With a height of , it is the highest point in t ...

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

, on 6 January 1851, when he was in his fifty-seventh year.

Publications

Davies edited the following works: * ''A Course of Mathematics for the use of the Royal Military Academy, by

Charles Hutton Charles Hutton FRS FRSE LLD (14 August 1737 – 27 January 1823) was a British mathematician and surveyor. He was professor of mathematics at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich from 1773 to 1807. He is remembered for his calculation of th ...

. The eleventh edition by

Olinthus Gregory Olinthus Gilbert Gregory (29 January 17742 February 1841) was an English mathematician, author, and editor. Biography He was born on 29 January 1774 at Yaxley in Huntingdonshire, the son of Robert, a shoemaker, and Ann, who also had three you ...

'', 1837, 2 vols.; the principal alterations, additions, and improvements in this work were made by Davies. * ''Solutions of the Principal Questions in Dr. Hutton's “Course of Mathematics,”'' 1840. * ''A Course of Mathematics, by C. Hutton, continued by O. Gregory; twelfth edition by T. S. Davies,'' 1841–1843, 2 vols. * ''The Mathematician'', ed. by T. S. Davies and others, 1845, 1847, and 1850. Of the above, ''Solutions of the Principal Questions'' is the most important work. It is a large octavo of 560 pages, enriched with four thousand solutions on nearly all subjects of mathematical interest and of various degrees of difficulty. A long catalogue of Davies's writings is printed in the ''Westminster Review'', April 1851, pp. 70–83.

References

* ;Attribution {{DEFAULTSORT:Davies, Thomas Stephens 1790s births 1851 deaths 19th-century British mathematicians Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Fellows of the Royal Society Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries of London Place of birth missing