Gabriel Oltramare

Gabriel Oltramare was a Swiss mathematician, born in Geneva on 19 July 1816 and died on 10 April 1906. He belonged to a prominent Geneva family of Italian Protestant origin and was the son of a watchcase maker. He studied mathematics and natural sciences in Geneva from 1836 to 1839, then higher mathematics at the Sorbonne, graduating in 1840, and after teaching in Aarau and spending a year as a tutor in Egypt he became privat-docent of mechanics at Geneva's industrial school, holding that post from 1845 to 1870. In 1848 he was appointed professor ordinarius of higher mathematics at the Academy of Geneva. He began with number theory, notably an 1855 note on the relations between linear and quadratic forms of prime numbers, and later worked on mathematical analysis, publishing in 1893 his treatise Essai sur le calcul de généralisation, which appeared in a second edition in 1899 and in a Russian translation in 1895. He also wrote on astronomy and meteorology, helped found the Institut national genevois in 1853, and sat on the Grand Council of Geneva.