April 23, 2011 <Back to Index>
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Johannes (van Waveren) Hudde (23 April 1628, Amsterdam – 15 April 1704, Amsterdam) was a burgomaster (mayor) of Amsterdam between 1672 – 1703, a mathematician and governor of the Dutch East India Company. As a "burgemeester" of Amsterdam he ordered that the city canals should be flushed at high tide and that the polluted water of the town "secreten" should be diverted to pits outside the town instead of into the canals. He also promoted hygiene in and around the town's water supply. "Huddes
stones" were marker stones that were used to mark the summer high water
level at several points in the city. They later were the foundation for
the "NAP",
the
now Europe-wide system for measuring water levels. Johannes
Hudde studied law in Leiden, but turned to mathematics under the influence of
his teacher Frans
van
Schooten. From 1654 to 1663 he worked under van Schooten and
with his fellow students Johan
de
Witt and Hendrik
van
Heuraet they translated Descartes's La
Géométrie into
Latin.
Each of the students added to the work. Hudde's contribution
consisted of a study on maxima and minima and a theory of equations. Hudde
corresponded with Baruch
Spinoza and Christiaan
Huygens, Johann
Bernoulli, Isaac
Newton and Leibniz.
Newton
and Leibniz mention Hudde many times and used some of his ideas
in their own work on calculus. |