John Napier was born on February 1st, 1550 in Merchiston Tower, Edinburgh, United Kingdom. Napier was born into a wealthy life due to his kin being from nobles. Since Napier was born into a wealthy household, he did not attend school until he was thirteen. When Napier enrolled in school he went to Saint Andrews University where he studied theology, which is the study of God and religious beliefs. Napier was very deep in his Christian Protestant religion, but was very anti-Catholic and criticized the Roman Catholic church. After graduating from his university, Napier became engrossed in astronomy. He spent time creating new methods and inventions for astronomers to calculate information. All of this time spending trying to formulate methods led Napier to find logarithms. He also discovered a formula for calculating spherical triangles, decimal notations for fractions, and exponential functions…show more content… In 1579, Sterling died and then Napier married Agnes Chisholm and had 10 more children. Napier was influenced by fellow mathematicians/inventors; Edmund Gunter, John Speidell, Thomas Urquhart, and Henry Briggs.
Since Napier has impacted math in such a major way, he is looked up to and honored still to this day. He has a college in Scotland named after him; "Edinburg Napier University" and has a crater on the moon named after him; "Napier", most likely due to his love of astronomy and him being from Scotland. There is also a memorial statue for him in the Saint Cuthbert's Church in Edinburgh, Scotland. John Napier died on April 4th. 1617 in Edinburgh, Scotland. Even though Napier has been passed for many years, his knowledge and findings are still being used by mathematicians, students, people around the world to this day. Napier impacted mathematics in a way that will never die off because of how relevant it still is to the present
