Isaac Barrow - Biography

Biography

Barrow was born in London. He was the son of Thomas Barrow, a linen draper by trade. In 1624, Thomas married Ann, daughter of William Buggin of North Cray, Kent and their son Isaac was born in 1630. It appears that Barrow was the only child of his union - certainly the only child to survive infancy. Ann died c. 1634, and the widowed father sent the lad to his grandfather, Isaac, the Cambridgeshire J.P., who resided at Spinney Abbey. Within two years, however, Thomas remarried, the new wife was Katherine Oxinden, sister of Henry Oxinden of Maydekin, Kent. Of this marriage, at least one daughter, Elizabeth (born 1641), in known to have survived.

Isaac went to school first at Charterhouse (where he was so turbulent and pugnacious that his father was heard to pray that if it pleased God to take any of his children he could best spare Isaac), and subsequently to Felsted School, where he settled and learned under the brilliant puritan Headmaster Martin Holbeach who ten years previously had educated John Wallis. Having learnt Greek, Hebrew, Latin and logic at Felsted, in preparation for university studies, he continued his education at Trinity College, Cambridge; his uncle and namesake Isaac Barrow, afterwards Bishop of St Asaph, was a Fellow of Peterhouse. He took to hard study, distinguishing himself in classics and mathematics; after taking his degree in 1648, he was elected to a fellowship in 1649. Barrow received an MA from Cambridge in 1652 as a student of James Duport; he then resided for a few years in college, and became candidate for the Greek Professorship at Cambridge, but in 1655 he was driven out by the persecution of the Independents. He spent the next four years travelling across France, Italy and even Constantinople, and after many adventures returned to England in 1659.

He is described as "low in stature, lean, and of a pale complexion, "slovenly in his dress, and having a committed and long-standing habit of tobacco use (an inveterate smoker ). He was otherwise known for his courageousness, particularly noted is the occasion of whilst journeying in the East, his having saved the ship to which he were upon by the merits of his own prowess, from capture by pirates. In respect to his courtly activities his aptitude to wit earned him favour with Charles II, and the respect of his fellow courtiers, in his writings one might find accordingly, a sustained and somewhat stately eloquence. An altogether impressive personage of the time, having lived a blameless life into which he exercised conduct with due care and conscientiousness .