Name/Title£10 note: Mary Somerville
About this object£10 note produced by the Royal Bank of Scotland, featuring Mary Somerville (1780-1872) on the obverse and two otters on the reverse. The obverse includes a quote from Somerville's 'On the Connection of the Physical Sciences': "Anyone who has observed the reflection of the waves from a wall on the side of a river after the passage of a steam-boat, will have a perfect idea of the reflection of sound and light."
MakerRoyal Bank of Scotland
Date Madec.2017
Period2010s
Place MadeScotland, Edinburgh
Place NotesRoyal Bank of Scotland Head Office, Edinburgh
Medium and MaterialsInorganic, polymer
MeasurementsH: 69 x W: 132 mm
Subject and Association Keywordswomen's writing & literature
Subject and Association KeywordsSTEM
Subject and Association KeywordsWomen's suffrage
Subject and Association Descriptionhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Somerville:
Mary Somerville (/ˈsʌmərvɪl/; née Fairfax, formerly Greig; 26 December 1780 – 29 November 1872) was a Scottish scientist, writer, and polymath. She studied mathematics and astronomy, and in 1835 she and Caroline Herschel were elected as the first female Honorary Members of the Royal Astronomical Society.
When John Stuart Mill organized a massive petition to Parliament to give women the right to vote, he made sure that the first signature on the petition would be Somerville's.
In 1834 she became the first person to be described in print as a 'scientist'. When she died in 1872, The Morning Post declared in her obituary that "Whatever difficulty we might experience in the middle of the nineteenth century in choosing a king of science, there could be no question whatever as to the queen of science".
Somerville College, a college of the University of Oxford, is named after her, reflecting the virtues of liberalism and academic success which the college wished to embody. She is featured on the front of the Royal Bank of Scotland polymer £10 note launched in 2017 along with a quotation from her work On the Connection of the Physical Sciences.
Named CollectionGlasgow Women's Library
Object TypeBank note
Object numberGWL-2017-96-7-2
Copyright Licence
Attribution - Share Alike (cc)