- For other uses, see Wrangler (disambiguation).
At the University of Cambridge in England, a wrangler is a student who has completed the third year (called Part II) of the mathematical tripos with first-class honours.
The highest-scoring student is named the "senior wrangler"; the second highest-scoring student is the "second wrangler"; the third highest is the "third wrangler", etc.
Senior wranglers have included some of Britain's most brilliant scientists, including John Herschel, George Stokes and Lord Rayleigh. Interestingly, there are some equally if not more famous names associated with the rank of second wrangler (James Clerk Maxwell, J.J. Thomson, Lord Kelvin). Legend has it that Kelvin was so confident that he had come top of the exam that he asked his servant to run to the Senate House and check who the second wrangler was. The servant returned and informed him, "You, sir!"
The culture of fierce competition at mathematics exams was typical of Cambridge for a long time, and for this reason Cambridge rather than Oxford is associated with most of England's best mathematical and scientific minds (the two universities were the only ones in England for several hundred years). However, it is certainly not true to say that top marks in the Cambridge maths exam guaranteed the senior wrangler success in life. The exams were largely a test of speed in applying familiar rules, and some of the most inventive and original students of maths at Cambridge did not come top of their class (Hardy was 4th, Sedgwick 5th and Keynes was 12th).
The first woman to top the maths list, albeit unofficially, was Philippa Fawcett, who took the exams in 1890. At the time, women were not officially ranked, although they were told how they had done compared to the men, so she came "above the senior wrangler"..
In the early 20th century, lists of students who had completed the mathematics exams were sorted alphabetically in each of the three classes of honours, and were not based on individual marks.
Students who achieve second-class and third-class maths degrees are known as Senior Optimes (second-class) and Junior Optimes (third-class); before 1995 Cambridge did not divide its examination classification in mathematics into 2:1s and 2:2s but now there are Senior Optimes Division 1 and Senior Optimes Division 2.
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