Hypatia of Alexandria: Mathematician and Martyr |  | Author: Michael A. B. Deakin
Publisher: Prometheus Books
Category: Book
List Price: $29.98
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Rating:  3 reviews
Sales Rank: 199053
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 222
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 9 x 6.1 x 1
ISBN: 1591025206
Dewey Decimal Number: 510.92
EAN: 9781591025207
ASIN: 1591025206
Publication Date: July 17, 2007
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Product Description
In the late fourth and early fifth centuries of our era, Hypatia of Alexandria was the world's greatest living mathematician and astronomer. A strikingly beautiful woman and a devoted celibate, she lived in a city as turbulent and troubled as Baghdad or Beirut is today. She achieved fame not only in her special field, but also as a philosopher, religious thinker, and teacher who attracted a large popular following. Her life ended tragically in violence at the hands of a rampaging mob of Christian fanatics, who killed her for her "pagan" beliefs, some say at the instigation of St. Cyril of Alexandria. This is the first biography of Hypatia to integrate all aspects of her life. Mathematician Michael Deakin emphasizes that, though she was a philosopher, she was first and foremost a mathematician and astronomer of great accomplishment. In a fascinating narrative that brings to life a richly diverse ancient society, he describes her work so that the mathematics, presented in straightforward terms, finds its true place in the context of her life as a whole. Deakin supplies full detail on the historical, intellectual, and religious context of Hypatia's times. He also analyzes the pattern of her life and thought, and finally gives an account of the events leading up to her lynch-mob execution. Although this outrageous crime has made Hypatia a powerful symbol of intellectual freedom and feminist aspiration to this day, Deakin makes clear that the important intellectual contributions of her life's work should not be overshadowed by her tragic death.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Very good September 19, 2007
Romualdo Arthur Caldas (Maceió, Alagoas- Brasil)
5 out of 15 found this review helpful
This book is very good. The historical context about Hypatia's time and life is very interesting. Read this book, you'll learn much more about the christian's church in the first times.
 A specialist's view July 27, 2007
SkookumPete (Canada)
22 out of 24 found this review helpful
This is a difficult book to evaluate. Deakin is a mathematician, not a classical historian, and apart from his discussion of Hypatia's place in Alexandrian mathematics, this biography contains little that is not already to be found elsewhere, most notably in Maria Dzielska's study. Deakin does a reasonable job of putting Hypatia in a cultural context, but his understanding of late antiquity is superficial and admittedly garnered largely from encyclopedias. On the other hand, he has closely studied the sources for Hypatia's life (which he includes in an appendix) and the meagre evidence for her influence on philosophy and science. His introduction to astrolabes and conic sections is of some intrinsic interest and helps illuminate the state of knowledge in the fifth century, but since we have not one shred of writing that is inarguably Hypatia's work, the connection is rather tenuous. Nonetheless Deakin's conclusions give a valuable new perspective on this best-known of female Hellenists: one of a teacher with a wide range of interests, if not an original thinker.
The Lost World of Hypatia March 14, 2008
Foster Morrison (North Potomac, MD USA)
5 out of 8 found this review helpful
The disappointing thing about this book is the lack of a good narrative. The problem is that there is so little known about Hypatia and her world that not a lot can be said. Try to imagine a colony in Egypt of mostly Greek ethnicity, where pagans and Christians both fought and coexisted and interacted, if not always well, with a Jewish minority. The culture was in decline and the science, such as it was, died with Hypatia. This resembles the contemporary USA more than Egypt or any place in North Africa or the Middle East today. The academic mathematics community has become utterly moribund and it is being followed by theoretical physics (see Lee Smolin's book "The Trouble with Physics"). Who is our version of Hypatia? Perhaps Lynn Margulis, a biologist whe dares to be different.
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