At the
University of Cambridge
, mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts.
Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge.
, established =
, other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
in England, a "Wrangler" is a student who gains
first-class honours
The British undergraduate degree classification system is a grading structure for undergraduate degrees or bachelor's degrees and integrated master's degrees in the United Kingdom. The system has been applied (sometimes with significant variati ...
in the final year of
the university's degree in mathematics. The highest-scoring student is the
Senior Wrangler
The Senior Frog Wrangler is the top mathematics undergraduate at the University of Cambridge in England, a position which has been described as "the greatest intellectual achievement attainable in Britain."
Specifically, it is the person who a ...
, the second highest is the Second Wrangler, and so on. At the other end of the scale, the person who achieves the lowest exam marks while still earning a third-class honours degree (that is, while still earning an honours degree at all) is known as the
wooden spoon Wooden Spoon may refer to:
* Wooden spoon, implement
* Wooden spoon (award)
A wooden spoon is an award that is given to an individual or team that has come last in a competition. Examples range from the academic to sporting and more frivolous e ...
.
Until 1909, the university made the rankings public. Since 1910, it has publicly revealed only the class of degree gained by each student. An examiner reveals the identity of the Senior Wrangler "unofficially" by tipping his hat when reading out the person's name, but other rankings are communicated to each student privately. Therefore, the names of only some 20th-century
Senior Wranglers
Senior (shortened as Sr.) means "the elder" in Latin and is often used as a suffix for the elder of two or more people in the same family with the same given name, usually a parent or grandparent. It may also refer to:
* Senior (name), a surname ...
(such as
Crispin Nash-Williams
Crispin St John Alvah Nash-Williams FRSE (19 December 1932 – 20 January 2001) was a British mathematician. His research interest was in the field of discrete mathematics, especially graph theory.
Biography
Nash-Williams was born on 19 Dece ...
,
Christopher Budd,
Frank P. Ramsey
Frank Plumpton Ramsey (; 22 February 1903 – 19 January 1930) was a British philosopher, mathematician, and economist who made major contributions to all three fields before his death at the age of 26. He was a close friend of Ludwig Wittgenste ...
,
Donald Coxeter,
Kevin Buzzard
Kevin Mark Buzzard (born 21 September 1968) is a British mathematician and currently a professor of pure mathematics at Imperial College London. He specialises in arithmetic geometry and the Langlands program.
Biography
While attending the Roy ...
,
Jayant Narlikar
Jayant Vishnu Narlikar (born 19 July 1938) is an Indian astrophysicist and emeritus professor at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA). He developed with Sir Fred Hoyle the conformal gravity theory, known as Hoyl ...
, George Reid and
Ben J. Green) have become publicly known.
Another notable was
Philippa Fawcett. She was educated at Newnham College, Cambridge which had been co-founded by her mother. In 1890, Fawcett became the first woman to obtain the top score in the Cambridge Mathematical
Tripos
At the University of Cambridge, a Tripos (, plural 'Triposes') is any of the examinations that qualify an undergraduate for a bachelor's degree or the courses taken by a student to prepare for these. For example, an undergraduate studying mathe ...
exams. Her score was 13 per cent higher than the second highest score. When the women's list was announced, Fawcett was described as "above the senior wrangler", but she did not receive the title of senior wrangler, as at that time only men could receive degrees and therefore only men were eligible for the Senior Wrangler title. The results were always highly publicised, with the top scorers receiving great acclaim. Women had been allowed to take the Tripos since 1881, after
Charlotte Angas Scott
Charlotte Angas Scott (8 June 1858 – 10 November 1931) was a British mathematician who made her career in the United States and was influential in the development of American mathematics, including the mathematical education of women. Scott ...
was unofficially ranked as eighth wrangler.
It was recorded that "virtually every high wrangler (for whom records exist) participated in some form of regular
physical exercise
Exercise is a body activity that enhances or maintains physical fitness and overall health and wellness.
It is performed for various reasons, to aid growth and improve strength, develop muscles and the cardiovascular system, hone athletic ...
to preserve his strength and stamina."
Obtaining the position of a highly ranked Wrangler created many opportunities for the individual's subsequent profession. Such individuals would often become
Fellow
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 ...
s initially, before moving on to other professions.
Throughout the United Kingdom and the British Empire, university mathematics professors were often among the top three Wranglers.
The order of Wranglers was widely publicised and shaped the public perception of mathematics as being the most intellectually challenging of all subjects. According to Andrew Warwick, author of ''Masters of Theory'', the term 'Senior Wrangler' became "synonymous with academic supremacy".
Past wranglers
Top marks in the Cambridge mathematics exam did not always guarantee the Senior Wrangler success in life; the exams were largely a test of speed in applying familiar rules, and some of the most inventive and original students of Mathematics at Cambridge did not come top of their class.
Kelvin
The kelvin, symbol K, is the primary unit of temperature in the International System of Units (SI), used alongside its prefixed forms and the degree Celsius. It is named after the Belfast-born and University of Glasgow-based engineer and phys ...
was second,
Bragg Bragg may refer to:
Places
* Bragg City, Missouri, United States
* Bragg, Texas, a ghost town, United States
* Bragg, West Virginia, an unincorporated community, United States
*Electoral district of Bragg, a state electoral district in South Austra ...
was third,
De Morgan De Morgan or de Morgan is a surname, and may refer to:
* Augustus De Morgan (1806–1871), British mathematician and logician.
** De Morgan's laws (or De Morgan's theorem), a set of rules from propositional logic.
** The De Morgan Medal, a trien ...
and
Hardy were fourth,
Sedgwick fifth,
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British mathematician, philosopher, logician, and public intellectual. He had a considerable influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, linguistics, ...
seventh,
Malthus ninth,
Keynes
John Maynard Keynes, 1st Baron Keynes, ( ; 5 June 1883 – 21 April 1946), was an English economist whose ideas fundamentally changed the theory and practice of macroeconomics and the economic policies of governments. Originally trained in m ...
twelfth, and some fared even worse:
Klaus Roth
Klaus Friedrich Roth (29 October 1925 – 10 November 2015) was a German-born British mathematician who won the Fields Medal for proving Roth's theorem on the Diophantine approximation of algebraic numbers. He was also a winner of the De Mo ...
was not even a wrangler.
Joan Clarke
Joan Elisabeth Lowther Murray, MBE (''née'' Clarke; 24 June 1917 – 4 September 1996) was an English cryptanalyst and numismatist best known for her work as a code-breaker at Bletchley Park during the Second World War. Although she did not ...
, who helped to break the Nazi Enigma code at Bletchley Park, was a wrangler at Cambridge and earned a double first in mathematics, although she was prevented from receiving a full degree based on the university's policy of awarding degrees only to men.
That policy was abandoned in 1948.
The present
Astronomer Royal
Astronomer Royal is a senior post in the Royal Households of the United Kingdom. There are two officers, the senior being the Astronomer Royal dating from 22 June 1675; the junior is the Astronomer Royal for Scotland dating from 1834.
The post ...
,
Lord (Martin) Rees of Ludlow, a wrangler, went on to become one of the world's leading scientists, also holding the posts of master of Trinity College (Cambridge), and President of the Royal Society, and being a member of the
Order of Merit.
Optimes
Students who achieve second-class and third-class mathematics degrees are known as Senior Optimes (second-class) and Junior Optimes (third-class). Cambridge did not divide its
examination classification in mathematics into 2:1s and 2:2s until 1995 but now there are ''Senior Optimes Division 1'' and ''Senior Optimes Division 2''.
In fiction
*"The Senior Wrangler" is a member of the
faculty of
Unseen University
The Unseen University (UU) is a school of wizardry in Terry Pratchett's ''Discworld'' series of Fantasy literature, fantasy novels. Located in the fictional city of Ankh-Morpork, the UU is staffed by a faculty composed of mostly indolent and ine ...
in
Terry Pratchett
Sir Terence David John Pratchett (28 April 1948 – 12 March 2015) was an English humourist, satirist, and author of fantasy novels, especially comical works. He is best known for his '' Discworld'' series of 41 novels.
Pratchett's first no ...
's
Discworld
''Discworld'' is a comic fantasy"Humorous Fantasy" in David Pringle, ed., ''The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Fantasy'' (pp.31-33). London, Carlton,2006. book series written by the English author Terry Pratchett, set on the Discworld, a flat ...
series of
novel
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...
s.
* Roger Hamley, a character in
Elizabeth Gaskell
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell (''née'' Stevenson; 29 September 1810 – 12 November 1865), often referred to as Mrs Gaskell, was an English novelist, biographer and short story writer. Her novels offer a detailed portrait of the lives of many st ...
's ''
Wives and Daughters
''Wives and Daughters, An Every-Day Story'' is a novel by Elizabeth Gaskell, first published in the ''Cornhill Magazine'' as a serial from August 1864 to January 1866. It was partly written whilst Gaskell was staying with the salon hostess M ...
'', achieved the rank of Senior Wrangler at Cambridge.
* Vivie Warren, the headstrong heroine of George Bernard Shaw's ''
Mrs. Warren's Profession
''Mrs. Warren's Profession'' is a play written by George Bernard Shaw in 1893, and first performed in London in 1902. The play is about a former prostitute, now a madam (brothel proprietor), who attempts to come to terms with her disapproving ...
'' (1893) and daughter of the play's infamous madam, tied with the Third Wrangler, settling for that place because she recognized that "it was not worth
erwhile to face the grind" because she did not intend an academic career for herself.
*"Wrangler" is a
jargon
Jargon is the specialized terminology associated with a particular field or area of activity. Jargon is normally employed in a particular Context (language use), communicative context and may not be well understood outside that context. The conte ...
term applied to
codebreakers
Cryptanalysis (from the Greek language, Greek ''kryptós'', "hidden", and ''analýein'', "to analyze") refers to the process of analyzing information systems in order to understand hidden aspects of the systems. Cryptanalysis is used to breach C ...
in some of
John Le Carré
David John Moore Cornwell (19 October 193112 December 2020), better known by his pen name John le Carré ( ), was a British and Irish author, best known for his espionage novels, many of which were successfully adapted for film or television. ...
's
spy
Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information (intelligence) from non-disclosed sources or divulging of the same without the permission of the holder of the information for a tangib ...
novels, such as ''
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
''Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy'' is a 1974 spy novel by British author John le Carré. It follows the endeavours of taciturn, aging spymaster George Smiley to uncover a Soviet mole in the British Secret Intelligence Service. The novel has receive ...
''.
* Thomas Jericho, the main character of
Robert Harris's book ''
Enigma
Enigma may refer to:
*Riddle, someone or something that is mysterious or puzzling
Biology
*ENIGMA, a class of gene in the LIM domain
Computing and technology
* Enigma (company), a New York-based data-technology startup
* Enigma machine, a family ...
'', was Senior Wrangler in 1938.
* In
Ford Madox Ford
Ford Madox Ford (né Joseph Leopold Ford Hermann Madox Hueffer ( ); 17 December 1873 – 26 June 1939) was an English novelist, poet, critic and editor whose journals ''The English Review'' and ''The Transatlantic Review'' were instrumental in ...
's ''
Parade's End
''Parade's End'' is a tetralogy of novels by the British novelist and poet Ford Madox Ford, written from 1924 to 1928. The novels chronicle the life of a member of the English gentry before, during and after World War I. The setting is mainly ...
'', reference is made to the fact that Christopher Tietjens came out of Cambridge as "a mere Second Wrangler".
* In
Rumer Godden
Margaret Rumer Godden (10 December 1907 – 8 November 1998) was an English author of more than 60 fiction and non-fiction books. Nine of her works have been made into films, most notably ''Black Narcissus'' in 1947 and '' The River'' in ...
's ''
In This House of Brede
''In This House of Brede'' is a novel by Rumer Godden published in 1969 by Viking in the US and by Macmillan in the UK.
Synopsis
The novel is a portrait of religious life in England that centers on Philippa Talbot, a highly successful professio ...
'', Dame Agnes is noted to have been Eighth Wrangler before entering the abbey.
* In
C S Forester
Cecil Louis Troughton Smith (27 August 1899 – 2 April 1966), known by his pen name Cecil Scott "C. S." Forester, was an English novelist known for writing tales of naval warfare, such as the 12-book Horatio Hornblower series depicting a Roya ...
's book, ''
The General'', a member of the main character's staff (the deputy assistant quartermaster-general, Spiller) is described as a Second Wrangler.
* In
Bram Stoker
Abraham Stoker (8 November 1847 – 20 April 1912) was an Irish author who is celebrated for his 1897 Gothic horror novel '' Dracula''. During his lifetime, he was better known as the personal assistant of actor Sir Henry Irving and busine ...
's ''The Judge's House'', the main character Malcom Malcomson is looking for a quiet place to stay whilst preparing his
Mathematical Tripos
The Mathematical Tripos is the mathematics course that is taught in the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge. It is the oldest Tripos examined at the University.
Origin
In its classical nineteenth-century form, the tripos was a ...
examinations. Mrs Witham, the inn's landlady, warns Malcom about the judge's house but the charwoman, Mrs Dempster, dispels these fears explaining she is not afraid of 'bogies' because they are only rats. Malcom replies "Mrs. Dempster,
..you know more than a Senior Wrangler! And let me say, that, as a mark of esteem for your indubitable soundness of head and heart, I shall, when I go, give you possession of this house, and let you stay here by yourself for the last two months of my tenancy, for four weeks will serve my purpose."
See also
*
List of mathematics awards
This list of mathematics awards is an index to articles about notable awards for mathematics. The list is organized by the region and country of the organization that sponsors the award, but awards may be open to mathematicians from around the wor ...
Notes
References
*
* D. O. Forfar (1996/7) ''What became of the senior wranglers?'', ''Mathematical spectrum'' 29, 1–4.
** a survey of the subsequent careers of senior wranglers during the 157 years (1753–1909) in which the results of Cambridge's mathematical tripos were published in order of merit.
* Peter Groenewegen (2003). '' A Soaring Eagle: Alfred Marshall 1842-1924''. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar. .
** gives the story about Rayleigh;
Alfred Marshall
Alfred Marshall (26 July 1842 – 13 July 1924) was an English economist, and was one of the most influential economists of his time. His book '' Principles of Economics'' (1890) was the dominant economic textbook in England for many years. I ...
was the commoner who came second to Rayleigh.
* C. M. Neale (1907) ''The Senior Wranglers of the University of Cambridge''. Availabl
online* Andrew Warwick (2003) ''Masters of Theory: Cambridge and the Rise of Mathematical Physics''. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
** a very thorough account of the Cambridge system in the 19th century. Appendix A lists the top 10 wranglers from 1865 to 1909 with their coaches and their colleges.
External links
Information on the wranglers in the period 1860–1940 can be extracted from the BritMath database:
Many of the wranglers who made careers in mathematics can be identified by searching on "wrangler" in:
The MacTutor History of Mathematics archive
{{University of Cambridge
1748 establishments in England
1909 disestablishments in England
Mathematical awards and prizes of the University of Cambridge
Mathematics education in the United Kingdom
Terminology of the University of Cambridge