Person: Teixeira, Gomes
Gomes Teixeira was a Portuguese mathematician and historian of mathematics.
Mathematical Profile (Excerpt):
- Gomes was baptised on 6 February in the church of his home town.
- His godparents were his cousin Dr Francisco Gomes de Carvalho and Maria Jose Teixeira.
- Gomes began his education in his home town of São Cosmado, which is about 80 km east of Porto.
- This small town had around 600 inhabitants when Gomes was born there and his initial education, where he was taught reading and writing, was at a primary school which, in July 1924, was renamed "School EB 2/3 Gomes Teixeira." For his secondary education, however, he had to move to the larger town of Lamego, about 12 km north west of São Cosmado.
- This college had been founded in 1859 and, at the time that Teixeira studied there, the director was the founder of the College, António Joaquim Lopes Roseira.
- As Teixeira's education progressed he was drawn in two different directions.
- The cousin, whom he was staying with, saw that Teixeira was a talented scientist and suggested that he should study mathematics and physics at university.
- It turned out to be a lucky toss of the coin but, as we see from the quote above, at this stage Teixeira was more attracted to physics than to mathematics.
- In 1869 Teixeira enrolled in the Mathematics Faculty of the University of Coimbra and he lived in the house of Filipe Quental (1824-1892).
- Things did not go well at first for Teixeira, mainly because his health was poor.
- However, after returning to the university, Teixeira was taught by Tôrres Coelho who strongly influenced him to become a mathematician.
- In his first year of study, 1869-70, Teixeira took courses on Higher Algebra, Inorganic Chemistry and Technical Drawing.
- One of Teixeira's lecturers at the University of Coimbra was Daniel Augusto da Silva (16 May 1814 - 6 October 1878).
- He was impressed with Teixeira's paper and encouraged him to submit some of his work to the Royal Academy of Sciences and, in 1872, da Silva presented Teixeira's paper Aplicaçao das fracçoes continuas à determinaçao das raizes das equaçoes Ⓣ(Application of the continuous fractions to the determination of the roots of the equations) to the Royal Academy of Sciences of Lisbon and it was published in volume 4 (1872-73) of their Journal.
- After graduating with his first degree on 21 July 1874 with the highest possible grade, Teixeira continued to undertake research at Coimbra and on 8 January 1875 submitted his thesis Importância da observaçao do transito de Venus pelo disco do sol para a determinaçao da paralaxe solar.
- At the age of 25, in 1876, Teixeira was appointed as a Substitute Lecturer at the University of Coimbra.
- In 1877 Teixeira founded the journal Jornal de Ciências matemáticas e astronómicas which was published by Coimbra University Press.
- In the second volume of this journal, which appeared in 1880, Teixeira published a paper on the integration of second order linear partial differential equations and an obituary of Giusto Bellavitis.
- Teixeira was named as third astronomer at the Astronomical Observatory of Lisbon in that year.
- At the time that Teixeira was elected, the leader of the party was Fontes Pereira de Melo who was Prime Minister of Portugal from January 1878 to May 1879 and again from November 1881 to February 1886.
- Although Teixeira does not seem to have played a major role in the Regenerator Party, it is clear from a number of letters that he received that he was very well respected by the other members.
- In November 1879, Teixeira took charge of the teaching of mathematical analysis at Coimbra and, in February of the following year, he was named as Professor.
- At the Polytechnic Academy, Teixeira occupied the chair of differential and integral calculus.
- The problem was posed again in 1895 and, in 1899 Teixeira was awarded the prize for his entry which was published as Tratado de las Curvas Especiales Notables Ⓣ(Treatise on notable special curves) in 1905.
- When Teixeira moved to Porto, the city had no university.
- Teixeira was appointed as the first president of the University of Porto and served in that role from 1911 to 1917.
- After he retired from teaching at the University of Porto, Teixeira embarked on his last major work, namely a history of mathematics in Portugal.
- Teixeira received many honours.
- There are streets and squares named for him in a number of towns: the Gomes Teixeira Square in Porto; the Rua Professor Doutor Francisco Gomes Teixeira, Porto; Rua Professor Doutor Francisco Gomes Teixeira in Carnaxide, Oeiras, Lisbon; and the Rua Francisco Gomes Teixeira in Setubal.
- Following his death in 1933, Teixeira was buried in the cemetery of the Church of São Cosmado.
Born 28 January 1851, São Cosmado, Armamar, Viseu, Portugal. Died 8 February 1933, Porto, Portugal.
View full biography at MacTutor
Tags relevant for this person:
Astronomy, Origin Portugal
Thank you to the contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0! 
- Github:
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- non-Github:
- @J-J-O'Connor
- @E-F-Robertson
References
Adapted from other CC BY-SA 4.0 Sources:
- O’Connor, John J; Robertson, Edmund F: MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive
