Somerville

American  

[suhm-er-vil] / ˈsʌm ərˌvɪl /

noun

1. Mary Fairfax Greig 1780–1872, Scottish mathematician and astronomer.

2. a city in E Massachusetts, near Boston.

3. a town in central New Jersey.

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Somerville British  

/ ˈsʌməvɪl /

noun

1. Mary, original name Mary Fairfax . 1780–1872, British scientific writer, author of Physical Geography (1848) and other textbooks. Somerville College, Oxford, was named after her

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Somerville Scientific  

/ sŭm′ər-vĭl′ /

1. Scottish astronomer and mathematician who wrote expository works on mathematics, physical geography, microscopic science, and astronomy. Her writings explained complex scientific ideas to the general public through simple illustrations and experiments that the average reader could easily understand.

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Example Sentences

Shirley-Anne Somerville has held onto the social justice brief, while also taking up the housing role.

From BBC • May 20, 2026

“You should be rebalancing when you feel least like rebalancing, and you should be buying when you feel least like buying,” said Sean Somerville, an investment advisor in Baltimore.

From Barron's • Feb. 13, 2026

Somerville told the BBC that while some people pay more tax, it was important to remember the benefits of this.

From BBC • Jan. 11, 2026

In nearby Somerville, construction of a nine-story life-sciences building has been on hold since July 2024.

From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 29, 2025

Whewell’s motive for raising the issue in print in 1834 may partly have been that ‘scientist’, unlike ‘man of science’, is a gender-neutral term—he was reviewing a book by the science writer Mary Somerville.

From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton