Nothing is more natural than honoring the greats scientist, the personalities whose talents have expanded our understanding of the material world. It is also selfevident that pictures of scientists are shown in many places; However, some of these graphs are unreliable. For example, the famous image of Archimedes getting out of the bath and screaming “Eureka!” is much later than the Sage of Syracuse.
Archimedes, in his bath, 1547. Handcolored woodcut by the 16thcentury Greek mathematician and inventor (c287212 BC). Image: public domain
It is perfectly understandable that ancient geniuses such as Plato, Archimedes and Democritus cannot be faithfully represented because we lack reliable data on their physical appearance. But there is one modern scientist, a mathematician of great importance, whose portrayal is a farce. This is the French mathematician AdrienMarie Legendre (17521833).
In the history of science, Legendre is one of the four great “Ls” that graced the world of mathematics in France in the 18th and 19th centuries, along with Laplace, Lagrange and Leverrier. Marcelo Viana, the director general of the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics, said: “Legendre did fundamental work in number theory, analysis, celestial mechanics and various applications of mathematics. There are several concepts with his name: Legendre transformation, Legendre symbol, Legendre relation, among others”.
This account by French mathematician AdrienMarie Legendre (17521833) is actually by someone else. Image: public domain
The names of 72 scientists are engraved on the Eiffel Tower, including Legendre. He was also knighted by Napoleon Bonaparte himself who was fascinated by mathematics. But despite his undoubted prestige, little is known about Legendre’s life, and there is no reliable picture of him. The paintings supposedly depicting the scientist and there are quite a few belong to someone else. Worse still, as Marcelo Viana also said: “They belong to someone whose actions have had a very negative impact on the mathematician’s life”.