-
Isaac Newton is born.
Newton was born three months after the death of his father, a prosperous farmer also named Isaac Newton. Born prematurely, he was a small child; his mother said that he could have fit inside a quart mug . When Newton was three, his mother remarried and went to live with her new husband, the Reverend Barnabus Smith, leaving her son in the care of his maternal grandmother -
Period: to
The life of Isaac Newton
-
Early Life
From the age of about 12 to 17, he was educated at The King's School, Grantham, but removed from school by his mother, who tried to force him to become a farmer. The master at the King's School, persuaded his mother to send him back to school so that he could complete his education. Motivated partly by a desire for revenge against a schoolyard bully, he became the top-rank student. The Cambridge psychologist considers it "fairly certain" that Newton suffered from an autism spectrum disorder. -
Returned Home
He returned home to learn the business of a farmer, but spent most of his time solving problems, making experiments, or devising mechanical models; his mother noticing this, sensibly resolved to find some more congenial occupation for him, and his uncle, having been himself educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, recommended that he should be sent there. -
He was admitted to Trinity College, Cambridge.
At that time, the college's teachings were based on those of Aristotle, whom Newton supplemented with modern philosophers and astronomers such as Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler. -
Binomial Theorem
He discovered the generalized binomial theorem and began to develop a mathematical theory that later became calculus. -
Obtains his degree
Soon after, the university temporarily closed as a precaution against the Great Plague. Although he had been undistinguished as a Cambridge student, Newton's private studies at his home in Woolsthorpe over the next two years saw the development of his theories on calculus, optics and the law of gravitation. -
Goes back to School
He returns to Cambridge, elected Minor Fellow of Trinity College. Fellows were required to become ordained priests, something he desired to avoid due to his unorthodox views. Luckily for Newton, there wasn't a specific deadline for ordination and could postpone it indefinitely. The problem became more severe later when he was elected for the prestigious Lucasian Chair, but he managed to avoid it becuse Charles II gave him special permission. -
Reflecting Telesope
Newton describes his reflecting telescope in a letter to Henry Oldenburg the first Secretary of the Royal Society in London. On his second visit to London he meets John Collins who was to give great support to his mathematical goals. -
Robert Boyle
Newton attends his first meetings of the Royal Society where he meets Robert Boyle (was a 17th century natural philosopher, chemist, physicist, and inventor, also noted for his writings in theology). His hypothesis on the properties of light is reads to the Society. Robert Boyle later dies in 1692. -
Returns to his Studies
Newton returned to his work on celestial mechanics, such as gravitation and its effect on the orbits of planets, with reference to Kepler's laws of planetary motion. -
The Death of his Mother
His mother dies, so he spends much of the year at Woolsthorpe. Corresponds with Hooke on planetary motion. (Robert Hooke was an experimental philosopher, scientist and architect and was the first curator of experiments for the Royal Society of London.) -
Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica
It lays the foundations for most of classical mechanics. Newton described universal gravitation and the three laws of motion, which dominated the scientific view of the physical universe for the next three centuries. He showed that the motions of objects on Earth and of celestial bodies are governed by the same set of natural laws, by demonstrating the consistency between Kepler's laws of planetary motion and his theory of gravitation. -
Nervous Breakdown
Newton suffers a nervous breakdown which is illustrated in his letters to Locke. -
Departure from Cambridge
He gets offered a post of Warden of the Royal Mint and he departs Cambridge for London. -
Newton appointed Master of the Mint.
Master of the Mint was an important office in the governments of Scotland and England, and later Great Britain, between the 16th and 19th centuries. The Master was the highest officer in the Royal Mint. -
Member of Parliament
He is elected as a Member of Parliament by the Cambridge Senate and resigns his chair as Lucasian Professor of mathematics. -
Knighted
He was knighted by Queen Anne in Cambridge during a visit to Trinity College, Cambridge. The knighthood is likely to have been motivated by political considerations connected with the Parliamentary election in May 1705, rather than any recognition of Newton's scientific work or services as Master of the Mint. Newton was a member of the British Parliament from 1689 to 1690 and in 1701. -
Royal Society
He attends the Royal Society for the last time due to his failing health. -
Isaac Newton dies.
Newton died in his sleep in London and was buried in Westminster Abbey. Newton, a bachelor, divided much of his estate to relatives during his last years, and died intestate. After his death, Newton's hair was examined and found to contain mercury, probably resulting from his alchemical pursuits. Mercury poisoning could explain Newton's eccentricity in late life.
