John Herivel
Author
1918 – 2011
Who was John Herivel?
John William Jamieson Herivel was a British science historian and former World War II codebreaker at Bletchley Park.
As a codebreaker concerned with Cryptanalysis of the Enigma, Herivel is remembered chiefly for the discovery of what was soon dubbed the Herivel tip or Herivelismus. Herivelismus consisted of the idea, the Herivel tip and the method of establishing whether it applied using the Herivel square. It was based on Herivel's remarkable insight into the habits of German operators of the Enigma cipher machine that allowed Bletchley Park to easily deduce part of the daily key. For a brief but critical period after May 1940, the Herivel tip in conjunction with "cillies" was the main technique used to solve Enigma.
After the war, Herivel became an academic, studying the history and philosophy of science at Queen's University Belfast, particularly Isaac Newton, Joseph Fourier, Christiaan Huygens. In retirement, he wrote an autobiographical account of his work at Bletchley Park entitled Herivelismus and the German Military Enigma.
We need you!
Help us build the largest biographies collection on the web!
- Born
- Aug 29, 1918
Belfast - Education
- Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge
- Lived in
- Belfast
- Died
- Jan 18, 2011
Submitted
on July 23, 2013
Citation
Use the citation below to add to a bibliography:
Style:MLAChicagoAPA
"John Herivel." Biographies.net. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 7 May 2024. <https://www.biographies.net/people/en/john_herivel>.
Discuss this John Herivel biography with the community:
Report Comment
We're doing our best to make sure our content is useful, accurate and safe.
If by any chance you spot an inappropriate comment while navigating through our website please use this form to let us know, and we'll take care of it shortly.
Attachment
You need to be logged in to favorite.
Log In