Tercentenary of John Bainbridge

Abstract

WHEN Sir Henry Savile (1549-1622), while holding the post of warden of Merton College, Oxford, founded the Savilian professorships of geometry and astronomy at Oxford in 1619, the first of these was given to Henry Briggs (1561-1630), who had held the chair of geometry at Gresham College, London, while to the second was appointed John Bainbridge, a London physician who had just published a description of a comet observed in November 1618. Bainbridge on his appointment was thirty-seven, and he continued to hold his chair until his death on November 3, 1643. Born at Ashby-de-la-Zouche, he had studied at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and had qualified in medicine. While teaching and practising he devoted his leisure to mathematics and astronomy. Removing to Oxford in 1620, he continued his study of the writings of the Greeks and Arabs, and though he published but little, he left a considerable number of manuscripts. These he bequeathed to his friend, the learned but unfortunate Archbishop James Ussher (1581-1656), whose library, after various vicissitudes, passed to Trinity College, Dublin. Bainbridge died at his house opposite Merton College, and after an oration by William Strode, his body was laid beside that of Briggs in Merton College Chapel.