Ladies in the Laboratory IV by Creese Mary R. S.;Creese Thomas M.;

Author:Creese, Mary R. S.;Creese, Thomas M.; [Creese, Mary R. S.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Published: 2015-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Four

Mathematicians and Astronomers

Mathematicians

Two Russian women, Sofia Kovalevskaia and Vera Shiff, published papers in mathematics that were listed by the Royal Society in its Catalogue of nineteenth-century journal publications; one other early Russian female mathematician, Liubov’ Zapol’skaia, is also noted here.

Sofia Kovalevskaia, the first female mathematician to be remembered primarily for achievement in mathematics, is one of the most extensively studied of all early women scientists, holding as she does a remarkably strong attraction for historians. Books and articles examining the many facets of her short, colorful life appear regularly, their numbers rivaling those devoted to Marie Curie, the prime example of a successful early woman scientist. This great wealth of detailed information on Kovalevskaia being readily available, only a short sketch of her life and work is offered below.

Sofia Vasilievna Korvin-Krukovskaia, later Sofia Kovalevskaia1 (1850–1891), the daughter of General Vasilii Vasilievich Krukovskii (1800–1875) and his wife, Yelisaveta Fedorovna (1820–1879), was born in Moscow on 15 January 1850. Her father, the commandant of the Moscow artillery garrison, came from a line of Cossack generals. In his later years, after persistent effort, he had his claim to descent from Hungarian king Matthias Korvin accepted by the College of Heralds, and duly joined the ranks of the minor nobility, changing his name to Korvin-Krukovskii. His wife (née Shubert) was descended from a family of German astronomers. Sofia had an elder sister, Aniuta (1844–1887), and a younger brother, Fedor (1855–1919).

In 1858 General Korvin-Krukovskii retired from the military and moved his family to his estate of Palibino, in the Vitebsk district of Belorussia. A traditional Russian patriarch, he was autocratic and somewhat stern, but highly cultured and well educated; he completely dominated his young and elegant wife, often treating her like a child, although she too was well educated and cultivated. During her earliest years Sofia was brought up by her nanny, one of the household serfs, who took care of her lovingly and was her steady and constant comfort and companion. Nanny gave her freedom to wander in the surrounding woods with her sister, but she also told her tales of terrifying dangers and strange monsters that gave the child nightmares. This had the result of bringing her even closer to Nanny, who reinforced her notion that her parents favored her little brother, the long hoped-for son and heir, and that her mother preferred the prettier Aniuta to her. When Sofia was eight years old, her father, realizing that his daughters were to some extent running wild despite the presence of a French governess in the household, banished Nanny to washerwoman status, dismissed the Frenchwoman, and brought in two new people, a Polish tutor, Iosif Ignatevich Malevich, and an English governess, Margaret Smith. Miss Smith strove to impose some English order on the chaotic Russian feudal household but after five years had to admit defeat in her efforts to convert her wild young Russian charge into an English lady; Sofia rebelled against Miss Smith’s regime and regularly found ways around her strict regulations.

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