Editing Georg Cantor (section)

==Cantor's ancestry==
[[File:Blackboard Georg Cantor (11-line V O building 24).jpg|thumb|The title on the memorial plaque (in Russian): "In this building was born and lived from 1845 till 1854 the great mathematician and creator of set theory Georg Cantor", [[Vasilievsky Island]], Saint-Petersburg.]]
Cantor's paternal grandparents were from [[Copenhagen]] and fled to Russia from the disruption of the [[Napoleonic Wars]]. There is very little direct information on them.<ref>''E.g.'', Grattan-Guinness's only evidence on the grandfather's date of death is that he signed papers at his son's engagement.</ref> Cantor's father, Georg Waldemar Cantor, was educated in the [[Lutheranism|Lutheran]] mission in Saint Petersburg, and his correspondence with his son shows both of them as devout Lutherans. Very little is known for sure about Georg Waldemar's origin or education.<ref name="pi87">[[#Purkert|Purkert and Ilgauds 1985]], p. 15.</ref> Cantor's mother, Maria Anna Böhm, was an [[Austro-Hungarian]] born in Saint Petersburg and baptized [[Roman Catholic Church|Roman Catholic]]; she converted to [[Protestantism]] upon marriage. However, there is a letter from Cantor's brother Louis to their mother, stating:
{{Blockquote|Mögen wir zehnmal von Juden abstammen und ich im Princip noch so sehr für Gleichberechtigung der Hebräer sein, im socialen Leben sind mir Christen lieber ... ("Even if we were descended from Jews ten times over, and even though I may be, in principle, completely in favour of equal rights for Hebrews, in social life I prefer Christians...")<ref name="pi87"/>}}

which could be read to imply that she was of [[Jewish]] ancestry.<ref>For more information, see: [[#Dauben1979|Dauben 1979]], p. 1 and notes; [[#Guinness1971|Grattan-Guinness 1971]], pp. 350–352 and notes; [[#Purkert|Purkert and Ilgauds 1985]]; the letter is from {{harvnb|Aczel|2000|pp=93–94}}, from Louis' trip to Chicago in 1863. It is ambiguous in German, as in English, whether the recipient is included.</ref>

According to biographer [[Eric Temple Bell]], Cantor was of Jewish descent, although both parents were baptized.<ref>[[Men of Mathematics|Men of Mathematics: The Lives and Achievements of the Great Mathematicians from Zeno to Poincaré]], 1937, E. T. Bell</ref> In a 1971 article entitled "Towards a Biography of Georg Cantor", the British historian of mathematics Ivor Grattan-Guinness mentions ([[Annals of Science]] 27, pp.&nbsp;345–391, 1971) that he was unable to find evidence of Jewish ancestry. (He also states that Cantor's wife, Vally Guttmann, was Jewish).

In a letter written to [[Paul Tannery]] in 1896 (Paul Tannery, Memoires Scientifique 13 Correspondence, Gauthier-Villars, Paris, 1934, p.&nbsp;306), Cantor states that his paternal grandparents were members of the Sephardic Jewish community of Copenhagen. Specifically, Cantor states in describing his father: "Er ist aber in Kopenhagen geboren, von israelitischen Eltern, die der dortigen portugisischen Judengemeinde...."  ("He was born in Copenhagen of Jewish (lit: 'Israelite') parents from the local Portuguese-Jewish community.")<ref>Tannery, Paul (1934) ''Memoires Scientifique 13 Correspondance'', Gauthier-Villars, Paris, p. 306.</ref>
In addition, Cantor's maternal great uncle,<ref>[[#Dauben1979|Dauben 1979]], p. 274.</ref>  [[Josef Böhm]], a Hungarian violinist, has been described as Jewish,<ref>Mendelsohn, Ezra (ed.) (1993) [http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/11440061?versionId=13425381 ''Modern Jews and their musical agendas''], [[Oxford University Press]], p. 9.</ref> which may imply that Cantor's mother was at least partly descended from the Hungarian Jewish community.<ref>''Ismerjük oket?: zsidó származású nevezetes magyarok arcképcsarnoka'', István Reményi Gyenes Ex Libris, (Budapest 1997), pages 132–133</ref>

In a letter to [[Bertrand Russell]], Cantor described his ancestry and self-perception as follows:
{{Blockquote|Neither my father nor my mother were of German blood, the first being a Dane, borne in Kopenhagen, my mother of Austrian Hungar descension. You must know, Sir, that I am not a ''regular just Germain'', for I am born 3 March 1845 at Saint Peterborough, Capital of Russia, but I went with my father and mother and brothers and sister, eleven years old in the year 1856, into Germany.<ref>Russell, Bertrand. ''Autobiography'', vol. I, p. 229. In English in the original; italics also as in the original.</ref>}}
 
There were documented statements, during the 1930s, that called this Jewish ancestry into question:
{{Blockquote|More often [i.e., than the ancestry of the mother] the question has been discussed of whether Georg Cantor was of Jewish origin. About this it is reported in a notice of the Danish genealogical Institute in Copenhagen from the year 1937 concerning his father: "It is hereby testified that Georg Woldemar Cantor, born 1809 or 1814, is not present in the registers of the Jewish community, and that he completely without doubt was not a Jew&nbsp;..."<ref name="pi87"/>}}