Hypatiaof

Alexandria

IntroductionMajor Accomplishment

Influences

Cause of Death

Legacy

“mhat shalam”

“Men will fight for superstition quite as quickly as for a living truth- often more so, since a superstition is so intangible you cannot get at it to refute it, but truth is a point of view, and so is interchangeable.”

- Hypatia of Alexandria

INTRODUCTION Hypatia of Alexandria was born in

Alexandria, Egypt, around 350 AD or 370AD and lived until 415 AD

A scholar, the first recognized women mathematician, astronomer and a philosopher.

the daughter of a mathematician and philosopher Theon.

She believed in the theories of Plato and Aristotle and the philosophy of Neoplatonism.

a charismatic teacher at the Library of Alexandria

Married to Isidorous of Alexandria a philosopher

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MAJOR ACCOMPLISHMENTS She wrote a commentary on the

13th volume of the famous Greek mathematics text book,  Diophantus’s of Arithmetica. (a founder of modern algebra)

She edited Ptolemy's famous astronomical works the 'Almagest'.

She also made a commentary on a famous work on Conics by 'Apollonius'.

CONICS APOLONIUS OF PERGA

“This concept developed the ideas of hyperbolas, parabolas, and ellipses. With Hypatia's work on this important book, she made the concepts easier to understand, thus making the work survive through many centuries. Hypatia was the first woman to have such a profound impact on the survival of early thought in mathematics.”

MAJOR ACCOMPLISHMENTS She edited her father's commentary on

'Euclid's Elements‘.“.. while making only inconsiderable additions to the

content of the "Elements", he endeavoured to remove difficulties that might be felt by learners in studying the book, as a modern editor might do in editing a classical text-book for use in schools; and there is no doubt that his edition was approved by his pupils at Alexandria for whom it was written, as well as by later Greeks who used it almost exclusively...” -Heath

She wrote a text "The Astronomical Canon."(Possibly a new edition of Ptolemy's Handy Tables.)

She invented the plane astrolabe, the graduated brass hydrometer and the hydroscope, with Synesius of Greece, who was her student and later colleague

The astrolabe is an ancient instrument that measures the position of heavenly bodie, stars and planets, apparatus for distilling water and an instrument for measuring the density of water.

“SUCH WORKS HAVE PERPETUATED THE LEGEND THAT SHE WAS NOT ONLY INTELLECTUAL BUT ALSO BEAUTIFUL, ELOQUENT, AND MODEST.”

-KRAMER

INFLUENCES Hypatia became head of the Platonist

school at Alexandria in about 400 AD. She symbolises learning and science

which the early Christians identified with paganism

teaching the philosophy of Neoplatonism. Hypatia based her teachings on those of Plotinus, the founder of Neoplatonism, and Iamblichus who was a developer of Neoplatonism around 300 AD.

PLOTINUSThere is an ultimate reality which is

beyond the reach of thought or language. The object of life was to aim at this ultimate reality which could never be precisely described.

Plotinus further stressed that, “People did not have the mental capacity to fully understand both the ultimate reality itself or the consequences of its existence.”

IAMBLICHUS

Distinguished the levels of reality in a hierarchy of levels beneath the ultimate reality. There was a level of reality corresponding to every distinct thought of which the human mind was capable.

CAUSE OF DEATH at the hand of a mob of Christian killed her

in, the year 415 AD in Alexandria, Egypt The cause of her death was instigated by

Saint Cyril of Alexandria rooted from a political dispute between the clergy and the governor of Alexandria (Orestes).

A few years later, according to one report, Hypatia was brutally murdered by the Nitrian monks who were a fanatical sect of Christians who were supporters of Cyril.

CAUSE OF DEATH What certainly seems indisputable is

that she was murdered by Christians who felt threatened by her scholarship, learning, and depth of scientific knowledge.

 Because of her association with Orestes, the pagan prefect of Alexandria who opposed the persecution of the Jews and other non-Christians initiated by Bishop Cyril

CAUSE OF DEATH From the writings

Socrates Scholasticus (5th century) John of Nikiû (7th century)

“. . . they dragged her along till they brought her to the great church, named Caesareum. Now this was in the days of the fast. And they tore off her clothing and dragged her . . . through the streets of the city till she died. And they carried her to a place named Cinaron, and they burned her body with fire.”

LEGACY Late Antiquity to the Age of Reason

a forged anti-Christian letter.The NeoPlatonist historian Damascius exploit the scandal of Hypatia's death

Maria Dzielska proposes that the bishop's body guards might have murdered Hypatia

in the 14th century,  (1021–1096), the second wife of Byzantine Emperor Constantine X Doukas, appeared "second Hypatia

Anti-Catholic tract Hypatia

LEGACY 19th Century

"literary legend of Hypatia" began to rise In 1843, German authors Soldan and

Heppe, History of the Witchcraft Trials that Hypatia may have been, in effect, the first famous “witch" punished under Christian authority

Charles Kingsley (best known as the author of The Water Babies) made her the heroine of one of his novels Hypatia, or New Foes with an Old Face in (1853)

In 1867, the early photograher Julia Margaret Cameron created a portrait of the scholar as a young woman.

LEGACY 20th Century

Fiction references appeared like "Madame Swann at Home,”  Heirs of Alexandria series written by Mercedes Lackey, Eric Flint and 

Dave Freer, Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, gave a detailed speculative description of

Hypatia's death, linking it with the destruction of the Library of Alexandria. A more scholarly historical study of her, Hypatia of Alexandria by Maria Dzielska (translated into English by F. Lyra, published by Harvard University Press), was named by Choice Magazine as an "Outstanding Academic Book of 1995, Philosophy Category".

Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy, published since 1986 by Indiana University Press. Judy Chicago's large-scale The Dinner Party awards her a place-setting, and other artistic works draw on or are based on Hypatia.

Honored her in the sciences, especially astronomy.  238 Hypatia, a main belt asteroid discovered in 1884, was named for her.

The lunar crater Hypatia was named for her, in addition to craters named for her father Theon and for Cyril. The 180 km Rimae Hypatia is located north of the crater, one degree south of the equator, along the Mare Tranquillitatis.[51]

By the end of the 20th century Hypatia's name was applied to projects ranging in scope from an Adobe typeface (Hypatia Sans Pro),[52] to a cooperative community house in Madison, Wisconsin. A genus of moth also bears her name.

LEGACY 21st Century

Her life is fictionalised by authors in many countries and languages. Examples are Ipazia, scienziata alessandrina by Adriano Petta Hypatia:

Scientist of Alexandria), and Hypatia y la eternidad by Ramon Galí, a fanciful alternate history, in Spanish (2009).[53] The 2008 novel Azazīl, by Egyptian Muslim author Dr. Yūsuf Zaydan, tells the story of the religious conflict of that time through the eyes of a monk, including a substantial section on Hypatia[54]; Zaydan's book has been criticized by Christians in Egypt.[55] Her life is portrayed in the Malayalam novel Francis Itty Cora (2009) by T. D Ramakrishnan.

Hypatia: A Novel of Ancient Egypt by Brian Trent; Flow Down Like Silver, Hypatia of Alexandria (2009) by Ki Longfellow, The Secret Magdalene[57]

; and The Plot to Save Socrates (2006) by Paul Levinson and his sequel novelette "Unburning Alexandria" (2008).

Hypatia of Alexandria: Mathematician and Martyr (2007) is a brief -113 page- biography by Michael Deakin, with a focus on her mathematical research. Hypatia has been considered a universal genius.

The 2009 movie Agora

Hypatia was a pagan philosopher that stood out between the women of her time and developed areas such astronomy and mathematics.  She was persecuted, tortured and murdered by a mob of christian fanatics.

ALL HYPATIA'S WORK IS LOST EXCEPT FOR ITS TITLES AND SOME REFERENCES TO IT. NEVERTHELESS NO PURELY PHILOSOPHICAL WORK IS KNOWN, ONLY WORK IN MATHEMATICS AND ASTRONOMY. BASED ON THIS SMALL AMOUNT OF EVIDENCE DEAKIN, ARGUES THAT HYPATIA WAS AN EXCELLENT COMPILER, EDITOR, AND PRESERVER OF EARLIER MATHEMATICAL WORKS.

Reporter:Mrs. Daisy Lynn J. Robin

“shukran”