Christiaan Huygens: the founder of modern mathematical physics

Christiaan Huygens Dutch mathematician, astronomer, and physicist, who founded the wave theory of light, discovered the true shape of the rings of Saturn, and made original contributions to the science of dynamics—the study of the action of forces on bodies.

Christiaan Huygens was born on 14 April 1629 in den Haag (the Hague), the second child of the poet and statesman Constantijn Huygens and his wife, Suzanna van Baerle. Christiaan’s father was one of the best-known poets and authors of the Netherlands, and Christiaan was taught at home by his father and private tutors.

From May 1645 until March 1647 Christiaan studies law and mathematics at the University of Leiden, the oldest university in the Netherlands. He studied classical mathematics as well as the modern methods of Viéte, Descartes, and Fermat.

Christiaan took courses from Franz van Schootens, the best-known mathematician in the Netherlands at that time, and a friend of (and prominent exponent of the ideas of) Descartes.

In 1651, Huygens was to discover a well-concealed flaw in the vast work of Gregorius van Saint-Vincent on the quadrature of the circle [the surface area under the segment of a circle], meriting this praise from Van Schooten for his work.

Huygens at first concentrated on mathematics: determinations of quadratures and cubatures, and algebraic problems inspired by Pappus’ works. In 1651 the Theoremata de quadratura hyperboles, ellipsis et circuli appeared, Huygens was to discover a well-concealed flaw in the vast work of Gregorius van Saint-Vincent on the quadrature of the circle [the surface area under the segment of a circle], meriting this praise from Van Schooten for his work.

In 1656 Huygens invented the pendulum clock. In 1664 Thévenot approached Huygens to offer him membership in an academy to be founded in Paris; Colbert proposed giving official status and financial aid to those informal meetings of scholars which had been held in Paris since Mersenne’s time. In 1666 Huygens became one of the founding members of the French Academy of Sciences, which granted him a pension larger than that of any other member and an apartment in its building.

Huygens wrote his greatest works - the Horologium Oscillatorium and the Treatise on Light – retired from the public eye in his home in Holland due to ill health.

In 1694 Huygens fell ill. He did not recover. He died the following summer in The Hague on 8 July 1695.
Christiaan Huygens: the founder of modern mathematical physics

The Dutch Golden Age

In 1579, seven of the seventeen Provinces of the Netherlands unenthusiastically declared their independence from the Habsburg King of Spain, to form the United Provinces, also known as the Union or the Dutch Republic. The new country achieved full international recognition in 1648, even though many states recognized its sovereignty much earlier.

The early Dutch Golden Age spans the period 1590-1648 (the Year of Independence from Spain), a period of unprecedented innovation and prosperity. This successful development has for a large part been attributed to trade via the Atlantic Ocean and the emergence of political institutions that provided secure property rights to broader segments of society.

The Dutch Golden Age benefited from an influx of immigrants to the cities. By 1600 more than 10 percent of the Dutch population were Protestants from the southern Netherlands who had moved for religious and economic reasons.

It boasts of cultural geniuses such as Rembrandt and Vermeer, philosophers such as Spinoza, scientists such as Van Leeuwenhoek, a booming economy, and successful trade organizations such as the Dutch East India Company (VOC). The Golden Age has also drawn the attention of scholars outside the Dutch academic world.

The Dutch Golden Age has been internationally admired and acclaimed for its impressive economic performance and its role in developing a world-economy.

The new Dutch Republic was the most prosperous nation in Europe, and led European trade, science, and art. Followed by a marked slackening, and after 1672 (the Year of Disaster, with the French-English invasion) stagnation.
The Dutch Golden Age