I first met Hypatia in Brussels in the spring of this year. She arrived in the guise of a paper in the briefcase of Dr Hilary Rose, professor emerita of social policy at the University of Bradford.
Dr Rose's question to the EU conference on women and science was simple: "Hypatia's daughters: where are they now?" Strangely, no-one seemed to know the answer although almost 400 of them were gathered together in the room.
Hypatia was an Alexandrine polymath who lived in the fifth century, a rarity in her time. But even today, finding women mathematicians, scientists and engineers is an intimidating task. Only at conferences, especially convened to bemoan the scarcity of her offspring, can Hypatia's daughters be found in any quantity. Of course, it is possible that the story of Hypatia had a somewhat demoralising effect on would-be emulators. "Hypatia was the daughter of Theon, a celebrated mathematician of Alexandria. She possessed an acute and penetrating judgment, and great sublimity and fertility of genius; and her talents were cultivated with assiduity by her father and other perceptors. "After she had made herself mistress of polite learning, and of the sciences of geometry and astronomy, as far as they were then understood, she entered upon the study of philosophy. . . . her love of science enabled her so far to subdue the natural diffidence of her sex, that she yielded to the public voice, and exchanged her female decorations for the philosopher's cloak."
Improving volume
This glorious high Victorian description was my second encounter with Hypatia, who, this time, visited me between the covers of a book, in Ireland. The description is contained within an improving volume entitled "Women of History" which was presented, in January 1894, to one Edith Alice Hudson, of the Saltaire Congregational Church Sunday School for "punctual attendance and good behaviour". Written by "standard authors", and published, on an unknown date, by Nimmo, Hay and Mitchell of Edinburgh, it finally came to rest in a second-hand bookshop in Dublin (price £5).
Surely, the presentation of this book to a Victorian girl is one of its great ironies. Very few Victorian papas would have been as liberal as Hypatia's fourth century father who encouraged her in her studies. But, perhaps it was Hypatia's modest, retiring, womanly manner that they hoped Edith Alice would emulate.
Back in Alexandria, Hypatia spent her time in public places discoursing on the systems of Plato, Artistotle and other masters. "A ready elocution and graceful address, united with rich erudition and sound judgment, procured her numerous followers and admirers . . . and though she was in her person exceedingly beautiful, she never yielded to the impulse of human vanity, or gave occasion to the slightest suspicion against her chastity." Equally, she "discovered no pride of learning", or so we are reassured.
Reported affair
But, sadly, so much merit excited envy as well as admiration. The local Bishop, Cyril, banished the Jews from Alexandria. Orestes, the prefect of the city, "a man of liberal spirit", reported the affair to the emperor. The bishop responded in kind complaining of the "seditious temper of the Jews". The emperor declined to intervene and "the affair rapidly advanced to the utmost extremity".
Five hundred monks, who espoused the cause of Cyril, met the prefect as he was passing through the streets in his chariot and reproached him. One threw a stone at his head and wounded him. The populace routed the monks and seized one of their leaders. Orestes promptly ordered his execution and Cyril buried his body in the cathedral, giving instructions that he should be named among the sacred martyrs.
Hypatia, who had always been highly respected by the prefect, was "supposed by the partisans of the Bishop to have been deeply engaged in the interests of Oreste." As she was returning home from the schools one day, the mob seized her and carried her to the Caesarian church, where they stripped her of her garments and put her to death "with extreme barbarity, and, having torn her body limb from limb, committed it to the flames".
Hardly an encouraging fate for would-be women mathematicians, scientists, philosophers, technologists and engineers. But, then again, we are far advanced from those barbaric times . . . are we not?
Womanly accomplishments
Glancing back at the last century, we can sympathise with Edith Alice Hudson who still lived in a world where the womanly accomplishments were needlework, sketching, a knowledge of languages and, perhaps, the use of the globe.
Women now have the vote. We can attend universities and institutes of technology. We can compete for third-level places on an equal playing field. We can join learned academies and societies. But invisible, yet very real, barriers to women's progress still exist. We will have to work very hard if we are to force our way into the elite circles, the men's clubs. In Brussels this year, Dr Rose pointed out that only 11 women have been awarded the Nobel prize compared to 441 men. "It is a case of men giving prizes to men", she remarked.
Dr Christine Wenneras calculated the "male bonus", the bonus for simply being a man, when it came to attaining postdoctoral positions in Sweden, as a factor of 2.6. Women had to produce 2.6 times more publications than men in order to achieve the same "scientific competence" score. Her paper, in Nature last year, forced a radical revision of the selection criteria.
The gathering of Hypatia's daughters in Brussels may spawn a new awareness of the difficulties women still face in the sciences today. Mrs Edith Cresson, of the European Commission, promised a gathering of statistics, and policy may well follow these statistics. Hypatia, who "excelled most of the philosophers of her age in mathematical and philosophical science" was murdered in the reign of the Emperor Theodosius II in the year 415. Perhaps the year of the women and science conference, 1998, will mark the beginning of a new era for her daughters.