List of amateur mathematicians

This is a list of amateur mathematicians—people whose primary vocation did not involve mathematics (or any similar discipline) yet made notable, and sometimes important, contributions to the field of mathematics.


 * Ahmes (scribe)
 * Ashutosh Mukherjee (lawyer)
 * Robert Ammann (programmer and postal worker)
 * John Arbuthnot (surgeon and author)
 * Jean-Robert Argand (shopkeeper)
 * Leon Bankoff (Beverly Hills dentist)
 * Rev. Thomas Bayes (Presbyterian minister)
 * Andrew Beal (businessman)
 * Isaac Beeckman (candlemaker)
 * Chester Ittner Bliss (biologist)
 * Napoléon Bonaparte (general)
 * Mary Everest Boole (homemaker, librarian)
 * William Bourne (innkeeper)
 * Nathaniel Bowditch (indentured bookkeeper)
 * Achille Brocot (clockmaker)
 * Jost Bürgi (clockmaker)
 * Marvin Ray Burns (veteran)
 * Gerolamo Cardano (medical doctor)
 * D. G. Champernowne (college student)
 * Thomas Clausen (technical assistant)
 * Sir James Cockle (judge)
 * Federico Commandino (medical doctor)
 * William Crabtree (merchant)
 * Nathan Daboll (cooper)
 * Henri Delannoy (army officer)
 * Felix Delastelle (bonded warehouseman)
 * Martin Demaine (goldsmith and glass artist)
 * Humphry Ditton (minister)
 * Harvey Dubner (engineer)
 * Henry Dudeney (civil servant)
 * Albrecht Dürer (painter)
 * Greg Egan (writer)
 * M. C. Escher (graphic artist)
 * Eugène Ehrhart (mathematics teacher)
 * John Ernest (painter)
 * Pasquale Joseph Federico (patent attorney)
 * Pierre de Fermat (lawyer)
 * Sarah Flannery (high school student)
 * Reo Fortune (anthropologist)
 * John G.F. Francis (research assistant)
 * Benjamin Franklin (printer and diplomat)
 * Bernard Frenicle de Bessy
 * Gemma Frisius (medical doctor)
 * Britney Gallivan (high school student)
 * James Garfield (United States President)
 * Antoine Gombaud (essayist)
 * Thorold Gosset (lawyer)
 * Jørgen Pedersen Gram (actuary)
 * Hermann Grassmann (school teacher)
 * John Graunt (haberdasher)
 * George Green (miller)
 * Aubrey de Grey (gerontologist)
 * André-Michel Guerry (lawyer)
 * Charles James Hargreave (judge)
 * Oliver Heaviside (telegraph operator)
 * Kurt Heegner (private scholar)
 * John R. Hendricks (meteorologist)
 * Anthony Hill (painter)
 * Paul Jaccard (botanist)
 * Alfred Bray Kempe (lawyer)
 * Thomas Kirkman (church rector)
 * Laurence Monroe Klauber (herpetologist)
 * Harry Lindgren (civil servant)
 * Ada Lovelace (countess)
 * Lu Jiaxi (high school physics teacher)
 * Kenneth McIntyre (lawyer)
 * Danica McKellar (actress)
 * Anderson Gray McKendrick (medical doctor)
 * Marin Mersenne (theologian)
 * Florence Nightingale (nurse and statistician)
 * George Phillips Odom Jr. (artist)
 * B. Nicolò I. Paganini (schoolboy)
 * Pāṇini (linguist)
 * Blaise Pascal (heir, private scholar)
 * Padmakumar (technician)
 * Henry Perigal (stockbroker)
 * Kenneth Perko (lawyer)
 * Ivan Pervushin (priest)
 * Piero della Francesca (painter)
 * Pingala (musician)
 * William Playfair (draftsman)
 * Henry Cabourn Pocklington (schoolmaster)
 * François Proth (farmer)
 * Ramchundra (head master)
 * Marjorie Rice (homemaker)
 * Olinde Rodrigues (banker, social reformer)
 * Lee Sallows (engineer)
 * Robert Schlaifer (classics scholar)
 * Robert Schneider (musician and record producer)
 * William Shanks (landlord)
 * Abraham Sharp (schoolmaster)
 * Simon Stevin (merchants clerk)
 * Alicia Boole Stott (secretary)
 * Paul Tannery (tobacco factory director)
 * Gaston Tarry (civil servant)
 * Niccolò Fontana Tartaglia (bookkeeper)
 * Nikola Tesla (engineer, inventor)
 * Sébastien Truchet (monk)
 * Franciscus Vieta (lawyer)
 * Giordano Vitale (soldier)
 * Walter Frank Raphael Weldon (evolutionary biologist)
 * Johannes Werner (parish priest)
 * Caspar Wessel (lawyer)
 * Leo Wiener (linguist)
 * Frank Wilcoxon (chemist)
 * Edouard Zeckendorf (medical doctor)