Thomas Hood

Thomas Hood, who lived from 1556 to 1620, was an English mathematician and physician, the first lecturer in mathematics appointed in England, a few years before the founding of Gresham College. He publicised the Copernican theory, discussed the nova of 1572, and innovated in the design of mathematical and astronomical instruments. He entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1573, took his B.A. in 1578 and was elected a fellow in the same year, took his M.A. in 1581 and obtained his Cambridge licence to practise as a physician in 1585. The merchant Thomas Smythe approached him in 1582 to lecture in mathematics, and the lectures, aimed first at militia commanders at the time of the Spanish Armada and later at naval needs and navigation, were given from 1588 to 1592. He collaborated with the engraver Augustine Ryther on celestial and terrestrial charts.