Poor Robin and Merry Andrew: mathematical humour in Restoration England

Abstract

‘A well-willer to the mathematicks …’; ‘a plain and mathematical method …’. Quite a number of authors in Restoration England used these and similar phrases on their title pages. Some hoped to bolster their hyperbolic claims to authority, even in non-mathematical fields. Others used them for boisterous satire, like the spoof astronomical almanacs by ‘Poor Robin, Knight of the Burnt Island’, or they mixed humour with serious instruction. As well as providing occasionally entertaining reading, these books provide a rare window onto popular perceptions of mathematics in a period when its usefulness and even its meaning provoked learned discussion.