Marshall Clagett

Marshall Clagett (January 23, 1916, Washington, D.C. – October 21, 2005, Princeton, New Jersey) was an American historian of science who specialized in medieval science.

John Murdoch describes him as "a distinguished medievalist" who was "the last member of a triumvirate [with Henry Guerlac and I. Bernard Cohen, who] … established the history of science as a recognized discipline within American universities" while Edward Grant ranks him "among the greatest historians and scholars of the twentieth century."

Clagett began his undergraduate education in 1933 at the California Institute of Technology.

In 1935 he transferred to George Washington University, there completing his bachelor's degree and in 1937 his master's degree.

He then studied history at Columbia University with Lynn Thorndike, receiving his Ph.D. in 1941.

After obtaining his degree he entered the US Navy as an ensign and, having served in the Pacific and on Okinawa, was discharged in 1946 with the rank of lieutenant commander.

After one year at Columbia University as an instructor in history and the history of science, Clagett joined the University of Wisconsin's Department of History of Science, eventually becoming Vilas Research Professor there.

Clagett held two visiting appointments (1958–59 and 1963) at the School of Historical Studies of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey and in 1964 he was appointed permanently to the faculty of the School of Historical Studies.

He wrote more than a dozen volumes on the history of science, many of them focusing on the role of mathematics in natural philosophy and

on pure mathematics.

From 1959 to 1964, he was also director of the University's Institute for Research in the Humanities.

At Wisconsin he organized an influential conference on Critical Problems in the History of Science and edited the resulting seminal volume of papers.

He was also a member of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Geschichte der Medizin, Naturwissenschaft und Technik, and the International Academy of the History of Science, which he served as vice president from 1968 to 1971.

Clagett became Professor Emeritus in 1986, continued research and writing, completing three of the planned four volumes of Ancient Egyptian Science.

He was honored with the following prizes:

A fellow of the Medieval Academy of America and past president of the History of Science Society, he was a member and former vice president of the American Philosophical Society.