1888-1972

American mathematician who made contributions to number theory and discovered the finite basis theorem. Mordell was educated at Cambridge and subsequently taught at Manchester University for 23 years. In 1945 he took a post at Cambridge, where he worked in collaboration with Harold Davenport. Together, they made significant advances in the geometry of numbers. Mordell became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1924 and was awarded the Sylvester Medal (1949). He was also president of the London Mathematical Society, from which he received the De Morgan Medal (1941).