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Hypatia of Alexandria
She was the salaried head of the Neoplatonic School in Alexandria, Egypt, from the year 400. Her students were pagan and Christian young men from around the empire. She was killed by a mob of Christians in 415, (Exact birthdate unknown) -
Elena Cornaro Piscopia
She was a child prodigy who studied many languages, composed music, sang and played many instruments, and learned philosophy, mathematics and theology. -
Maria Agnesi
She was the oldest of 21 children and a child prodigy who studied languages and math, She wrote a textbook to explain math to her brothers which became a noted textbook on math. -
Sophie Germain
She studied geometry to escape boredom during the French Revolution when she was confined to her family's home, and went on to do important work in mathematics, especially her work on Fermat's Last Theorem.
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Mary Fairfax Somerville
Known as the "Queen of Nineteenth Century Science," she fought family opposition to her study of math, and not only produced her own writings on theoretical and mathematical science, she produced the first geography text in England. -
Ada Lovelace
The only daughter of Byron, the poet, her translation of an article on Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine includes notations that describe what later became known as a computer and as software. -
Sofia Kovalevskaya
She escaped her parents' opposition to her advanced study by a marriage of convenience, moving from Russia to Germany and, eventually, to Sweden, where her research in mathematics included the Koalevskaya Top and the Cauchy-Kovalevskaya Theorem. -
Charlotte Angas Scott
Raised in a supportive family that encouraged her education, Charlotte Angas Scott became the first head of the math department at Bryn Mawr College. Her work to standardize testing for college entrance resulted in the formation of the College Entrance Examination Board. -
Alicia Stott
She translated Platonic and Archimedean solids into higher dimensions, taking years at a time away from her career to be a homemaker. -
Amalie Emmy Noether
Called by Albert Einstein "the most significant creative mathematical genius thus far produced since the higher education of women began," Noether escaped Germany when the Nazis took over, and taught in America for several years before her unexpected death.
