Savilian Professor of Geometry

Sir Henry Savile, the Warden of Merton College, Oxford, and Provost of Eton College, was deeply saddened by what the 20th-century mathematician Ida Busbridge has termed "the wretched state of mathematical studies in England", He required the professors to be men of good character, at least 26 years old, and to have "imbibed the purer philosophy from the springs of Aristotle and Plato" before acquiring a thorough knowledge of science. He wanted students to be educated in the works of the leading scientists of the ancient world, saying that the professor of geometry should teach Euclid's Elements, Apollonius's Conics, and the works of Archimedes; tuition in trigonometry was to be shared by the two professors. As many students would have had little mathematical knowledge, the professors were also permitted to provide instruction in basic mathematics in English (as opposed to Latin, the language used in education at Oxford at the time). ==Appointment==

Savile's first choice for the professorship of geometry was Edmund Gunter, Professor of Astronomy at Gresham College, London. It was reported that Gunter demonstrated the use of his sector and quadrant, but Savile regarded this as "showing of tricks" rather than geometry, and instead appointed Henry Briggs, the Gresham Professor of Geometry, in 1619. Briggs took up the chair in 1620 at an annual salary of £150 and thus became the first person to hold the first two mathematical chairs established in Britain. As part of reforms of the university in the 19th century, the University of Oxford commissioners laid down new statutes for the chair in 1881. The professor was to "lecture and give instruction in pure and analytical Geometry", and was to be a Fellow of New College. Edward Titchmarsh (professor from 1931 to 1963) said when applying that he was not prepared to lecture on geometry, and the requirement was removed from the duties of the professor to enable his appointment, although the title of the chair was not changed. ==Professors' house==

formerly used by the geometry professors John Wallis (professor 1649–1703) rented a house from New College on New College Lane from 1672 until his death in 1703; at some point, it was divided into two houses. Towards the end of his life, David Gregory (the Savilian Professor of Astronomy) lived in the eastern part of the premises: although no lease between Wallis and Gregory survives (if one was ever made between the two friends), Gregory's name appears for the first time in the parish rate-book of 1701. Wallis's son gave the unexpired portion of the lease to the university in 1704 in honour of his father's long tenure of the chair, to provide official residences for the two Savilian professors. New College renewed the lease at a low rent from 1716 and thereafter at intervals until the last renewal in 1814. Records of who lived in each house are not available throughout the period, but surviving documentation shows that the professors often sub-let the houses and for about twenty years in the early 18th century the premises were being used as a lodging house. Stephen Rigaud lived there from 1810 until he became the astronomy professor in 1827; thereafter, Baden Powell lived there with his family. The geometry professors were associated with the houses for longer than the astronomy professors: when the Radcliffe Observatory was built in the 1770s, the post of Radcliffe Observer was coupled to the astronomy professorship, and they were provided with a house in that role; thereafter, the university sublet the astronomy professor's house itself. In the early 19th century, New College decided that it wished to use the properties for itself and the lease expired in 1854. ==List of professors==