Isaac Newton was born on Christmas Day
On this day · 25 December 1642
By the calendar England used at the time, the man who would explain gravity entered the world on December 25, 1642.
On Christmas Day, 25 December 1642, Isaac Newton was born at Woolsthorpe Manor, in the parish of Colsterworth, Lincolnshire. His father had died months earlier, and the infant was reportedly so small and frail that few expected him to survive. He would go on to live to 84.
The date carries a famous wrinkle. England still kept the Julian (“Old Style”) calendar, so Newton’s countrymen recorded his birthday as 25 December 1642. Most of Catholic Europe had already switched to the Gregorian calendar, which placed the same day at 4 January 1643. Both dates describe the very same morning.
“By the calendar in use at the time of his birth he was born on Christmas Day 1642.”
Newton later became President of the Royal Society and is buried in Westminster Abbey, his monument standing against the choir screen. His work on motion, gravity, and optics reshaped physics for centuries.
Sources & references
2 referencesWell-established. Corroborated by 2 independent sources.
