Harriot/Hariot/Harriott, Thomas (1560-1621): Thomas Harriot was a brilliant scientist, mathematician, astronomer, and explorer of Elizabethan England. He graduated from St. Mary’s Hall at Oxford University, and shortly thereafter entered the service of Sir Walter Raleigh as an instructor of the theory and practice of the mathematics of navigation to both Raleigh and the various sea captains under Raleigh’s employ. Harriot was involved with the preparations for, and perhaps was a member of, Raleigh’s 1584 exploratory expedition to the New World under Amadas and Barlowe. The expedition returned with two Algonquian Indians, Manteo and Wanchese, from whom Harriot was able to study the Algonquian language. Harriot was instrumental in the planning of the 1585 venture under Sir Richard Grenville, and acted as Raleigh’s representative on the voyage, charged with studying and reporting on the commercial potential of any plants or minerals, as well as the inhabitants of Roanoke Island and the surrounding area. He evidently recorded a great deal of scientific observations during his year in the Roanoke colony, but unfortunately, right at the beginning of the return voyage home on Drake’s ships, much of this valuable data was thrown overboard and lost during a terrifying tempest. Upon returning to England, Harriot compiled A briefe and true report of the new found land of Virginia, first published in 1588, next in 1589 as part of Hakluyt’s Principall Navigations, and then combined together with the engraved illustrations of Thomas White in Theodore de Bry’s four-language, 1590 publication. In the following years, during which time he corresponded with Johnannes Kepler, Harriot’s various and brilliant scientific pursuits involved extensive studies of the uses of mathematics in navigation, cartography, astronomy and optics. He died in 1621 of cancer of the nose.
Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, ed. William S. Powell. (Chapel Hill: UNC Press, 1988), s.v. “Harriot (Hariot or Harriott), Thomas.”