British Astronomy

Isaac Newton

1643–1727 · Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire

Explained why the planets move as they do. His law of universal gravitation, published in the Principia in 1687, showed that the pull that brings an apple to the ground also holds the Moon in orbit. He built the first practical reflecting telescope in 1668.

Portrait: Godfrey Kneller

John Flamsteed

1646–1719 · Greenwich

The first Astronomer Royal, appointed by Charles II in 1675. From Greenwich he catalogued nearly 3,000 stars, and in 1690 he recorded Uranus without realising it, listing it as the star 34 Tauri.

Portrait: T. Gibson

Edmond Halley

1656–1742 · London

Realised that comets seen in 1531, 1607 and 1682 were one object on a 76-year orbit, and predicted its return in 1758. He died before it reappeared on Christmas Day that year. He also paid for the printing of Newton's Principia.

Portrait: Thomas Murray

William Herschel

1738–1822 · Bath and Slough

A German-born musician who settled in Bath and built his own telescopes. On 13 March 1781 he found Uranus, the first planet discovered since antiquity. He went on to find Titania and Oberon, then Mimas and Enceladus, and discovered infrared light in 1800.

Portrait: Lemuel Francis Abbott

Caroline Herschel

1750–1848 · Bath and Slough

William's sister, and a formidable astronomer in her own right. She discovered eight comets, became the first woman paid for scientific work when George III granted her a salary in 1787, and won the Royal Astronomical Society's Gold Medal in 1828.

Portrait: M. F. Tielemanm

Mary Somerville

1780–1872 · Jedburgh and London

Her English rendering of Laplace's celestial mechanics made the mathematics of the Solar System accessible. In 1835 she and Caroline Herschel became the first women elected to the Royal Astronomical Society. She appears on the Royal Bank of Scotland £10 note.

Portrait: Thomas Phillips

John Couch Adams

1819–1892 · Laneast, Cornwall and Cambridge

As a young Cambridge graduate in 1845, he calculated where an unseen planet must be to explain wobbles in the orbit of Uranus. Urbain Le Verrier did the same in France, and Neptune was found in Berlin on 23 September 1846, close to both predictions.

Portrait: Hubert von Herkomer

William Lassell

1799–1880 · Liverpool

A brewer and amateur astronomer who built superb telescopes. He discovered Triton just 17 days after Neptune itself was found, and later Ariel and Umbriel, two moons of Uranus, in 1851.

Bernard Lovell

1913–2012 · Jodrell Bank

Founded Jodrell Bank in 1945. The great telescope that now bears his name was finished in 1957, in time to track the rocket that carried Sputnik 1 into orbit.

Patrick Moore

1923–2012 · Selsey, West Sussex

Presented The Sky at Night from its first broadcast in April 1957 until his death in 2012, making it the longest-running television series with the same presenter. An expert observer of the Moon, he inspired generations of amateur astronomers.

Colin Pillinger

1943–2014 · The Open University

Led Beagle 2, Britain's Mars lander, which set down on Christmas Day 2003 but never called home. In 2015, the year after his death, NASA images showed it had landed safely but its solar panels had not fully opened.