Pierre de Fermat Biography
(French Mathematician and Founder of the Modern Theory of Numbers)
Birthday: December 6, 1607 (Sagittarius)
Born In: Beaumont-de-Lomagne, France
Pierre de Fermat was a 17th century French mathematician who made significant contributions towards the development of infinitesimal calculus. He did path breaking research in into number theory and discovered several new patterns in numbers which had puzzled mathematicians for centuries. Born into a wealthy family of high social ranking, he decided to pursue legal profession as was expected from young men of his social stature in those days in spite of his deep love for mathematics. But embarking on a professional field totally unrelated to the field of mathematics did not keep the young man from becoming an amateur mathematician in his own right. Initially he wrote about his mathematical discoveries to his friends in letters, often with little or no proofs. Later on as he gained in prominence, his findings were published and circulated widely. Highly inspired by the works of the Hellenistic mathematician Diophantus, he, along with René Descartes, went on to become one of the two leading mathematicians of the first half of the 17th century. His works played a pivotal role in the development of infinitesimal calculus and he made notable contributions to analytic geometry, probability, and optics