JOHN WALLIS: BIOGRAPHY, CONTRIBUTIONS AND ACCOLADES - BIOGRAPHIES - 2025

John Wallis (1616-1703) was an Englishman who stood out in the area of ​​mathematics by being the creator of the symbol that is now known as infinity. His initial training was as a priest, but he was a man who acquired a large amount of knowledge in other sciences such as physics, where he raised the principle of conservation of momentum.

Wallis became one of the leading proponents of mathematics in his day. His contributions were prior to the appearance of Isaac Newton, also English. He even had an important role within the government, working as a cryptographer.

Source:, via Wikimedia Commons.

Wallis was also part of the group of philosophers and scientists who, since 1645, had held informal meetings to discuss the different branches of knowledge. This group later mutated and formed what is now known as the Royal London Society for the Advancement of Natural Science.

Biography

The city of Ashford, in the county of Kent, was the site of origin of John Wallis, in England. He was born on November 23, 1616.

His education began in his hometown, where he attended a school where he learned languages, quickly mastering everything related to English and Latin. His educational advances were momentarily slowed by the plague that broke out in London and affected thousands of people.

The town of Ashford, just 50 kilometers away from the English capital, was also a danger zone. Wallis moved a little further to the south of England, to the town of Tenterden where he attended a private school and learned about grammar.

Shortly afterwards he moved again, this time further to the north of England, when he settled in Essex. By then he was 14 years old and entered a school where he acquired knowledge of logic, deepened his training in Latin and learned Greek.

He entered Emmanuel College in 1632. While studying at Cambridge University, he received his first mathematical knowledge thanks to the teachings of his brother Henry. Since then it has been a branch in which he felt a lot of interest, but which he learned on his own.

In 1637 was his graduation in arts and three years later he completed his training with a doctorate in theology, also managing to be ordained as a priest. Languages ​​were very present during his education and he received some courses on astronomy.

He was a man who mastered areas such as music, languages ​​and also knew about medicine and anatomy. His first mathematical knowledge was demonstrated thanks to cryptography, when he worked for the government deciphering some messages.

Religious life

Wallis became bishop of the city of Winchester, which is in southern England. He served for several years as a chaplain.

He came to have a role as a minister between 1643 and 1653, when a council of theologians was formed who were able to rethink the structure of the church in England. This council received the name of Assembly of the Theologians of Westminster. It was an initiative that emerged after the beginning of the English Civil War.

His parliamentary role did not last long due to his marriage to Susanna Glyde, which occurred on March 14, 1645.

Teaching career

He served as a professor at Oxford, a decision that caused some surprise in the university community because Wallis was not known for any accomplishments in that area. In this way, he began his role as an educator in 1649. This appointment was key to his professional future, being a position that he held for more than 50 years until his death.

At the same time he was chosen as curator of the university archives. This was considered a very important position in the university and of great political power.

The decision to be a teacher and curator at the same time created even more annoyance, but over time he convinced his detractors thanks to his work protecting the material in the archives.

Family

Wallis was one of the children of the couple of John Wallis and Joanna Chapman. His father, with whom he shared the same name, was a reverend in Ashford and with Chapman he had his second marriage.

John Wallis was the third child the couple had. In total there were five: Wallis, two women and two other men. Wallis' father died when he was just a six-year-old boy.

Wallis started his own family in 1645 when he decided to marry Susanna Glyde. The couple had three children, two girls and a boy, who also received the name John Wallis and was born in 1650.

Death

The death of John Wallis occurred on November 8, 1703 when the Englishman was 86 years old. He died in the city of Oxford and his remains were buried in the university church of St. Mary the Virgin. In the temple there is a memorial in his honor commissioned by his son.

Influence

His mathematical training was carried out almost entirely independently. That is why the analyzes he made on the works of other authors were very important. He studied the German Johannes Kepler, the Italian Bonaventura Cavalieri and obviously the French René Descartes.

The methods that Wallis developed were very much in the style of Descartes in relation to the analytical process that his procedures followed.

Contributions and acknowledgments

He did not receive major awards or recognition for his work in mathematics. The greatest recognition is having been considered as the most influential Englishman in the area of ​​before the appearance of Isaac Newton.

In Ashford, Wallis's hometown, there is a school named after him. John Wallis Academy specializes in the areas of mathematics and computers and has more than a thousand students at its facilities each year.

Contribution in mathematics

The influence of Wallis in the area was very great and very varied. His work had an impact on different branches such as calculus, geometry and trigonometry.

He introduced new terms, such as the use of infinity and the design of the symbol or the idea of ​​the continued fraction and linear numbers. Some historians have even affirmed that he corroborated the Pythagorean theorem, but there is no evidence to support this fact.

He had a very important role in transcribing his ideas and mathematical principles. He went on to publish a large number of books, although the most prominent were Algebra, which came out in 1685, Traditional Logic published two years later, and Mathematical Opera in 1695.

In other areas

His knowledge was so extensive that he had a very important role during the Civil War in England as a cryptographer. He managed to decipher a large number of messages for the government of the day and he did it in exceptional time. He refused to explain his methods.

In 1653 he published Del Speech, a book in which the first ideas on how to teach deaf-mutes to speak were captured. Although this advance is also attributed to other authors such as Amman in Holland or Bonet in Spain.

Plays

The importance of John Wallis is more evident thanks to the written works of his authorship. He demonstrated his great knowledge with the publication of works on different topics. As a translator, he was in charge of putting the works of authors such as the Greek Claudius Ptolemy into Latin.

He published some writings on music in which he dealt with topics such as tuning and the organs that were used in the English territory. He also wrote on theology.

Of all his publications and writings on mathematics, Wallis only wrote one in English: Algebra in 1685. Latin was the language of choice for Wallis for his publications.

The arithmetic of infinitesimals

It was one of his most important publications that Wallis made. This work had a great impact on the later work of Isaac Newton. Thanks to this publication, his contribution in the development of the infinitesimal calculus is partially recognized, since normally the credit is given to Newton and Leibniz.

The previous works of Torricelli, Descartes and Cavalieri served as inspiration for the writing of this book.

Universal mathematics

It was published in 1657. It was the book in which he finally introduced the symbol ∞ to represent infinity. He developed other notations that served when using powers.

Treatise on conic sections

Apolonio de Perga treated the subject in Century III a. C. Wallis' input on this issue had to do with his description of the curves. His study of the conic sections is very similar to the way it is done today. This treatise was published by Wallis in 1659.

Other works

His publications were completed with works such as Mechanics or Tractor of Movement. It was printed in three different parts, from 1669 to 1971. Wallis talked about topics like the gravity of the earth.

Grammar of the English language came to light in 1652 and he began to raise his ideas about the language. It was one of the works that was copied the most and different authors claimed the authorship of Wallis's thoughts.

References

1. Beeley, P., Scriba, C. and Mayer, U. (2005). Correspondence of John Wallis (1616-1703), Volume 2. Oxford: Oxford University Press, UK.
2. Dons, U. (2004). Descriptive adequacy of early modern English grammars. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
3. Neal, K. (2011). From discrete to continuous. Dordrecht: Springer.
4. Wallis, J. (2014). Writings on music. Burlington, VT: Ashgate.
5. Wallis, J. and Stedall, J. (2004). The arithmetic of infinitesimals. New York, NY: Springer.