Isaac Barrow field of work mathematics
Early career
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; he enrolled there because of an offer of support from an unspecified member of the Walpole family, "an offer that was perhaps prompted by the Walpoles' sympathy for Barrow's adherence to the Royalist cause." 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 having refused to sign the Engagement to uphold the Commonwealth, he obtained travel grants to go abroad.
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