Claude Hardy

Claude Hardy was a practising lawyer and took part in the weekly meetings of Roberval, Mersenne and others. He was also a friend of Gassendi and Mydorge. Hardy introduced Mydorge to Descartes.

Hardy, in his capacity as a lawyer, worked for the Parliament in Paris from 1625. A year later he was certainly attached to the court of justice in Paris as a counsellor.

In 1630 he published Examen and in 1638 Refutation. These works dealt with the problem of the duplication of the cube and Hardy pointed out a fallacy which had arisen regarding this problem.

Hardy took part in many of the mathematical discussions and arguments of the time but his greatest contribution was his knowledge of Arabic and other languages which enabled him to make important Latin translations of Euclid's Data and other books.

Despite the fact that he introduced Mydorge to Descartes, Hardy supported Descartes when the two had a dispute over Fermat's method of maxima and minima, a forerunner to the calculus.

Texto original por: J J O'Connor and E F Robertson

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JOC/EFR December 1996	School of Mathematics and Statistics University of St Andrews, Scotland
The URL of this page is: http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/history/Mathematicians/Hardy_Claude.htm