List of child prodigies

Ludwig van Beethoven was recognised as a child prodigy.

This is a list of notable people who, typically before 15 years old, showed abilities comparable to those of highly skilled adults in specific fields; hence the term child prodigy.

Mathematics and science

Mathematics

From left to right, Gabriel Carroll, Reid Barton, Liang Xiao, and Zhiqiang Zhang, the four perfect scorers in the 2001 IMO.

• Juan Caramuel y Lobkowitz (1606–1682) was a Spanish scholastic philosopher, ecclesiastic, mathematician and writer. He was a precocious child, early delving into serious problems in mathematics and even publishing astronomical tables in his tenth year.
• Akshay Venkatesh (born 1981) Won a bronze medal at the International Physics Olympiad at 11 years of age. Won a Bronze medal at the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) at 12. Graduated university at age 15 with a double major in mathematics/physics. Finished his PhD at 20 from Princeton University. Associate Professor at 23.
• André-Marie Ampère (1775–1836) wrote a treatise on conic sections at the age of 13 and mastered much of known mathematics by the age of 18.
• Jason Levy: Born 1972 : Began York University in Toronto in 1982 at age 10. Graduated with Specialized Honours B.A. in Mathematics at 14. Received his M.Sc. (Mathematics) from the University of Toronto in 1987 at age 15. Completed his PhD in Mathematics at University of Toronto in 1993 at age 20.
• March Tian Boedihardjo (born 1998), at 9 became the youngest student to enroll in a Hong Kong university.
• Ted Kaczynski (born May 22, 1942), the "Unabomber", was a child prodigy who excelled academically from an early age. Kaczynski was accepted into Harvard University at the age of 16, where he earned an undergraduate degree, and later earned a PhD in mathematics from the University of Michigan. He became an assistant professor at the University of California, Berkeley at age 25, but resigned two years later.
• Gabriel Carroll, a prodigy who earned the highest SAT score in the state of California, including a perfect 800 in math, in seventh grade.
• Erik Demaine (born 1981) Became an assistant professor at MIT at 20 years of age.
• Per Enflo (born 1944) Swedish mathematician, also a piano prodigy
• Anne-Marie Imafidon is one of youngest students to graduate from the University of Oxford.
• Srinivasa Ramanujan (1887–1920) - was an Indian mathematician and autodidact who, with almost no formal training in pure mathematics, learned college-level mathematics by age 11, and generated his own theorems in number theory and Bernoulli numbers by age 13 (including independently re-discovering Euler's identity).
• Évariste Galois (1811–1832), as a bored and rebellious Lycée pupil was introduced to Legendre's book on Geometry. In the words of E.T.Bell he, "read it as easily as other boys read a pirate yarn". Ignoring his teachers, he himself sought out and studied the works of Lagrange and Abel.
• Ruth Lawrence (1971), passed the Oxford University interview entrance examination in mathematics, coming first out of all 530 candidates sitting the examination at the age of 10. At the age of 13 she became the youngest to graduate from the University of Oxford in modern times.
• Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777–1855) made his first ground-breaking mathematical discoveries while still a teenager. Also at the age of 3 watched his father add up his accounts and corrected him.
• Francis Galton (1822-1911), was an English Victorian polymath: anthropologist, eugenicist, tropical explorer, geographer, inventor, meteorologist, proto-geneticist, psychometrician, and statistician. He was knighted in 1909.
• William Rowan Hamilton (1805–1865), a mathematician, read Hebrew at seven years old, and studied Arabic, Persian, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Sanskrit and four other continental languages at 12 years old.
• Jay Luo (born 1970), received his B.Sc. from Boise State University with honors in mathematics at the age of 12 to become the youngest university graduate in United States history.
• Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) was a French mathematician, physicist, and religious philosopher who wrote a treatise on vibrating bodies at nine years old; his first proof, on a wall with a piece of coal, at 11 years old, and a theorem by 16 years old. He is famous for Pascal's theorem and many other contributions in mathematics, philosophy, and physics.
• William James Sidis (1898–1944) set a record in 1909 by becoming the youngest person to enroll at Harvard College, at 11 years old.
• Terence Tao (born 1975), youngest medalist in International Mathematical Olympiad history, at age 10.
• Norbert Wiener (1894–1964) began graduate studies at age 14 at Harvard and was awarded PhD at 18 for a dissertation on mathematical logic.
• Cameron Thompson (born 1997) began studying for his degree at the age of 11 with the Open University whilst still a high school student. At age 15 Cameron is shortly to complete his degree at the same time as his GCSE examinations. Cameron was the subject of the BBC Documentary "Growing Pains of a Teenage Genius".

Mental calculators

Note: Several mathematicians were mental calculators when they were still children. Mental calculation is not to be confused with mathematics. This section is for child prodigies largely or primarily known for calculating skills.

• Zerah Colburn (born 1804) had a major display of his ability at age eight.
• Ettore Majorana (1906-1938) could multiply two 3 digit numbers in his head in seconds at the age of 4.
• John von Neumann (1903–1957) A "mental calculator" by six years old, who could tell jokes in classical Greek.
• Priyanshi Somani (born 1998) won 1st place in the 2010 Mental Calculation World Cup at age 11.
• Jerry Newport (born 1948), autistic calculating savant at age seven, already using calculus to compute third and higher roots, title holder of "Most Versatile Calculator, won in 2010. Self-discovered much number theory in elementary school—perfect numbers, Fibonacci, etc.
• Truman Henry Safford (1836–1901) could square 18 digit numbers at ten years old; later in life, he became an astronomer.
• Shakuntala Devi (1929-2013) was an Indian prodigy mental calculator, who was known for her very rapid calculation abilities - despite having no formal education.

Physics

• Enrico Fermi In 1918, Fermi enrolled at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa. In order to enter the Institute, candidates had to take a difficult entrance exam which included an essay. The given theme was Specific characteristics of Sounds (Italian: Caratteri distintivi dei suoni). The 17-year-old Enrico Fermi chose to derive and solve the partial differential equation for a vibrating rod, applying Fourier analysis. The examiner, Prof. Giuseppe Pittarelli, interviewed Fermi and concluded that his entry would have been commendable even for a doctoral degree. Enrico Fermi achieved first place in the classification of the entrance exam.
• Mikaela Fudolig (born 1991), finished college at 16 years old with a degree in physics, summa cum laude and class valedictorian (Class of 2007), at the University of the Philippines. She entered the university at 11 years old. Currently, she is studying physics at the same university for the Master's degree.
• Christopher Hirata (born 1982) Youngest American (at 13) to win a gold medal in the International Physics Olympiad (1996). Entered Caltech at the age of 14, earned PhD in Physics from Princeton at age 22.
• Abdus Salam (1926–1996) At the age of fourteen, Salam scored the highest marks ever recorded for the Matriculation Examination at the Punjab University. A Nobel laureate in Physics for his work in Electro-Weak Theory, Salam holds the distinction of being the first Pakistani Nobel Laureate to receive the prize in the Physical Sciences.
• Wolfgang Pauli (1900–1958) had an understanding of advanced mathematics by the age of 13 and graduated with a PhD in Physics at the age of 21.
• Tathagat Avatar Tulsi (born 1987) received an undergraduate degree at 10 years old, got a Ph.D. at 21 & was offered a position of assistant professor at IIT B at 22.
• Kim Ung-Yong (born March 8, 1962) graduated with a Ph.D. in physics at the age of 15.
• Taylor Wilson (born 1994), nuclear scientist and engineer who built a bomb at age 10, and a nuclear fusion reactor at age 14. Improved nuclear technology and made a low-cost cherenhov particle detector at age 17, as well as winning the Intel Science Fair.

Astronomy

• Tanishq Mathew Abraham (born 2003) is an American child prodigy with Indian (East) ancestry who joined the on-campus college Astronomy class at 7 years old. Not only did he pass the course with an A grade but he was the top student among his college classmates (the youngest in the world). He is also one of the youngest members of American Mensa, joining at 4 years old in 2008. As of 2010, he and his younger sister, Tiara Thankam Abraham are the youngest siblings to both join Mensa at 4 years old.

Chemistry

• Ainan Celeste Cawley (born 1999) passed Chemistry O level at 7 years and 1 month (the youngest in the world) and studied Chemistry at tertiary level, at a Polytechnic, from 8 years and 4 months old.

Biology

• Colin Carlson - 13 years old, Carlson studies at the University of Connecticut where he's seeking a bachelor's degree in ecology and evolutionary biology and another in environmental studies. He started reading around the age of 2 or 3 and pursues a Ph.D. in ecology and evolutionary biology and a degree in environmental law for a career in conservation science. He intends to earn the two degrees by age 22.

• Evan Ehrenberg - born in 1993, at age 16 started a Ph.D. program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the Brain and Cognitive Sciences department studying computational neuroscience. Graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a B.A. degree in cognitive science with an emphasis in computational modeling, highest honors, at age 16. Won the Robert J. Glushko Prize for distinguished undergraduate research in cognitive science at age 16 for his research on a 'Layered sparse associative network for soft pattern classification and contextual pattern completion.'

• Gabriel See, born in 1998, achieved a 720 out of 800 score on the SAT math test at age 8, Performed T-cell receptor research at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center at age 10, and at age 11 won a silver medal at the international Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition on synthetic biology for undergraduate college students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 2011 he was named one of the US's top 10 high school inventors by Popular Science magazine. He has been taking upper division courses each semester at the University of Washington since 2010.

Psychology

• Jean Piaget (1896–1980) published a paper on the albino sparrow at 11 years old, and later became a psychologist.

Computer science

• Stephan Wolski (born 1998). At the age of 13 completed high school and enrolled at the College of Southern Maryland and at the age of 15 graduated with an A.S. Degrees in Applied Science and Technology, he plans to earn his bachelor's degree in Computer science at the University of Maryland.

Medicine

• Akrit Jaswal (born April 23, 1993) is an Indian adolescent who is a child prodigy as a physician. He performed his first surgery at the age of seven. He is the youngest person (at age 12) to get admitted in a medical university in India.
• Balamurali Ambati graduated from high school at 11 years old, was a college junior by 12 years old, and a doctor at 17 years old.
• Avicenna memorized the Qur'an at 10 years old and studied medicine at 13 years old.
• Sho Yano started college at nine years old and graduated summa cum laude at 12 years old from Loyola University Chicago. By 12 years old, he attended the Pritzker School of Medicine.

Engineering

Materials engineering

• Alia Sabur (born 1989) received an undergraduate degree at 14 years old, and became a college professor at 18 years old.

Mechanical engineering

• Karl Benz (1844-1929) started at the scientifically oriented Lyzeum at nine years old, went on to study at the Poly-Technical University under the instruction of Ferdinand Redtenbacher, and, on September 30, 1860, at an age of just 15, he passed the entrance exam for mechanical engineering at the University of Karlsruhe, which he subsequently attended. Benz was graduated July 9, 1864 at age nineteen. Karl Benz later became the pioneering founder of the automobile manufacturer Mercedes-Benz designing the Benz Patent-Motorwagen, widely regarded as the very first automobile.

• Sunny Sanwar (born 1989) could fluently read, write or speak six languages by the age of eight, and drew exceptionally detailed portraits by age seven (eventually going on to be one of the youngest artists to have a solo exhibition at the National Art Gallery with work in permanent collection at the Liberation War Museum). He finished four years of high school in 8 months with honors and received a scholarship at Kansas University, Engineering School at 16 where he was a college senior (final year student) in Mechanical Engineering by 18 and taught university courses in engineering at 21.

The arts

Acting/directing

Note: This section is mostly limited to child actors or directors who were respected enough to be nominated or to win awards while in competition with adults, or who were declared prodigies. It also includes a few actors, from eras predating film, who were declared theatrical prodigies. This section must be limited this way because being even an award-winning child actor is not prodigious. (For child actors who won juvenile competition, see Academy Juvenile Award. These names do not necessarily equate with being competitive with adults and therefore do not necessarily count as prodigies.)

• William Henry West Betty was a sensation as a boy doing Voltaire and Shakespeare roles.
• Jackie Cooper was the youngest nominee for the Best Actor Oscar at age nine years old.
• Quinn Cummings was an Oscar and Golden Globe Award nominee at 10 years old. She is now a businesswoman and blogger.
• Brandon deWilde at seven years old, was the first child actor to win the Donaldson Award; his talent was praised by John Gielgud in the following year. He was also a nominee for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar at 11 years old, in Shane and starred in his own sitcom television series on ABC at the same time.
• Jodelle Ferland received a daytime Emmy nomination at four years old and, at 12 years old, was nominated at the 27th Genie Awards for lead actress.
• Justin Henry was the youngest nominee for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar at eight years old, in Kramer vs. Kramer.
• Patty McCormack was nominated for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar at 11 years old, in an era when child actors could still be nominated for the Juvenile Award.
• Frankie Michaels, at 11 years old, received praise and a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical for his role in Mame.
• Tatum O'Neal won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar at 10 years old, for her 1973 role in Paper Moon, making her the youngest person ever to win a regularly awarded Oscar.
• Haley Joel Osment was nominated for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar at 11 years old.
• Anna Paquin won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar at 11 years old.
• Ricky Schroder won a Golden Globe Award at nine years old, youngest winner ever.
• Kishan Shrikanth - Directed a feature film on 35 mm, of 130 mins Care of Footpath at age nine and entered the Guinness Book of World Records for being the youngest film director on this earth.
• Shirley Temple, at five years old, showed talent as an actress and tap dancer. When she was seven years old, she received a special Academy Award. She was described as a prodigy by Time (magazine) in 1936.
• Ernest Truex (1889–1973) performed Shakespeare at six years old.

Music

See List of music prodigies.

Literature

• Rituparna Bhattacharjee, an Indian child prodigy who wrote Bhutiya at the age of 11 in 1998.
• Rubén Darío - Nicaraguan poet.
• Harold Bloom - American literary critic and Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale. Bloom claims that as a child he went to the Melrose branch of the New York Public Library and borrowed the works of Hart Crane, T. S. Eliot, Auden, William Blake, and Shakespeare. He claims that: "I memorized almost instinctively all of [William Blake's] long poems. I went from Blake to Milton and from Milton to Shakespeare...I read my way through the Melrose library. I am probably the largest monster of reading I have ever known. I can read at a shocking rate and I can remember nearly everything." In the 1940s, at the Fordham library, Bloom would "ransack" the large and complex dictionaries and concordances. M. H. Abrams, Bloom's advisor at Cornell, describes him during his undergraduate years as "[A] formidable person. He was a prodigy, beyond anything I'd ever seen -- and there was never anyone since who came close."
• William Cullen Bryant was published at 10 years old; at 13 years old, he published a book of political-satire poems .
• Thomas Chatterton started as a poet at 11 years old. He began writing the poems that would make him famous at 12 years old.
• Lucretia Maria Davidson, by 11 years old, had written some poems of note; before her death at 16 years old, she received praise as a writer.
• Marjorie Fleming, who died in 1811 before the age of nine, became a published poet half a century later.
• Barbara Newhall Follett began working on a novel at 8 and was published by age 12.
• H. P. Lovecraft recited poetry at two years old and wrote long poems at five years old.
• Christopher Marlowe: as a child, attracted the attention of Matthew Parker and went on to be a major 16th century London playwright. He is the eponymous Marlowe of the Marlovian theory of Shakespearean authorship.
• Alexander Pope: was a child prodigy as a poet, with gifts all but universally acknowledged. He is the third most frequently quoted writer in The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, after Shakespeare and Tennyson.
• Arthur Rimbaud wrote influential French poetry throughout his early and late teens. Victor Hugo described him at the time as "an infant Shakespeare."
• Henriett Seth F.: Henriett had a long history of visual art, poetry and writing in her childhood; beginning at age nine and at age thirteen, [5], but she gave up creative music career altogether at the age of 13. Henriett universal effect of all that was what we now call autism and savant syndrome
• Lope de Vega wrote his first play at 12 years old. He could also read Latin proficiently at the age of five years old.
• Brianna and Brittany Winner published their first novel at 12 and became America's youngest multiple award winning authors. At the end of fourth grade they used a speech to text software to complete an 80,000-word novel and were recognized as child prodigies in 2010.
• Minou Drouet caught the notice of French critics at the age of eight, leading to speculation that her mother was the true author of her poetry. She later proved herself to be the author.
• Marien Defalvard attends prestigious Lycée hypokhâgne at age 14, and wrote his first novel at an early age.
• Adora Svitak is an American writer who teaches literature on Internet at an early age, and show writing abilities at age 6.

Visual arts

• Albrecht Dürer
• John Everett Millais was a painter who entered the Royal Academy at 11 years old.
• Alexandra Nechita is a painter who had a solo exhibit at eight years old.
• Pablo Picasso painted Picador at eight years old. See List of Picasso artworks 1889-1900.
• Kieron Williamson, an eight-year-old watercolor artist from Norfolk, England whose second exhibition sold out in 14 minutes, raising £18,200 for 16 paintings.
• Wang Yani had her paintings appear on postage stamps at six years old and in worldwide museum exhibits at 12 years old.
• Zhu Da became a poet by seven years old. He later became a painter.
• Akiane Kramarik born in 1994, sold paintings worth $3M USD at age 7
• Marla Olmstead born in 2000, sold paintings worth over $20,000 at age 6 and had international recognition.
• Aelita Andre born in 2007, sold paintings worth over $30,000 at age 4 and had international recognition.
• Henriett Seth F.: Henriett had a long history of visual art, poetry and writing in her childhood; beginning at age nine and at age thirteen, [6], but she gave up creative music career altogether at the age of 13. Henriett universal effect of all that was what we now call autism and savant syndrome

Humanities

Academics

• Nguyễn Hiền (1234 - ?), a Vietnamese prodigy, who earned the first-rank doctorate laureate in the year of 1247 when he was 13 years old.
• Michael Kearney earned the first of several degrees at 10 years old. He became a college teacher by 17 years old.
• Gregory R. Smith - entered college at 10 years old and was first nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize at 12 years old.
• Colin Maclaurin went to study divinity in University of Glasgow at the age of 11 and remained until he was 19 years, 7 months old in the year 1717 when he was elected professor of mathematics, where for nearly three hundred years he held the record as the world's youngest professor.
• Alexander Faludy in 1998 became the youngest undergraduate at the University of Cambridge since 1773.
• Pierre Bouguer (1698–1758) was appointed professor of hydrography in 1713 at the age of 15.

Humane Letters: Leadership, Teaching, Evangelism

• Aman Rehman made more than 1000 animated movies, beginning at three years old., and, at 8, he became the youngest college-lecturer in the world.
• Cao Chun (Born unknown, died 210) was the son of the famous Chinese warlord Cao Cao became the youngest person to ever fight for an army higher than the rank of major.
• Mohammad Hossein Tabatabai (born 1991) memorized all the Quran at the age of 5.
• Mohammad Baqir al-Sadr (1935–1980) was an Iraqi Shi'a cleric who memorized the Quran at a very early age and wrote his first book by the age of 12 called Fadak in History. He later went on to lay the foundation for modern economics and banking in Islam. He also wrote "Our Philosophy" which is an important a critique of both socialism and capitalism, as well as write the textbook for Jurisprudence which is used by many Islamic Seminaries today. He was one of the leading Islamic intellectuals of the 20th century and died at the age of 45.

Law/political science/philosophy

• Jeremy Bentham studied Latin at three years old and entered The Queen's College, Oxford at 12 years old.
• Hugo Grotius: entered the University of Leiden to study under Joseph Scaliger at age 11. At age 15 he was acclaimed by King Henry IV of France as the 'miracle of Holland'.
• Saul Kripke was invited to apply for a teaching post at Harvard while still in high school.
• John Stuart Mill knew several dead languages by eight years old and studied scholastic philosophy at 12 years old.
• Kathleen Holtz began university studies at 10 years old, entered UCLA law school at 15 years old, and passed the California bar exam at 18 years old.
• Stephen A. Baccus began studying law at 14 years old, graduated University of Miami law school at 16 years old, and passed Miami bar exam at 17 years old. He fought minimum-age requirements for bar-exam applicants in both New York and Miami.
• Pichamon Yeophantong became the youngest undergraduate at Thammasat University at 13 years old, graduating with a 4.00GPA; later graduated with a Master's degree, first-class honours, at 18, followed by a PhD in International Relations both from the Australian National University; held visiting positions at Peking University and National Taiwan University; offered fellowships at Oxford, Princeton, and Thammasat at age 22; homeschooled, could speak eight languages by her early teens.

Linguistics/translation

• Maria Gaetana Agnesi (1718–1799) was a multilingual prodigy who went on to become a mathematician.
• Asad Ullah Qayyum, at seven years old, was able to deliver speeches in 12 languages.
• John Barratier could speak German, Latin, French and Dutch at the age of 4; knew six languages at the age of 11.
• George Boole (1815–1864) could speak English, Latin, Greek, German, Italian, and French by his early teens.
• Jean-François Champollion knew several dead languages by the time he was 10 years old and read an important paper at the Grenoble Academy at 16 years old.
• Edmond-Charles Genêt (1763-1834) could read French, English, Italian, Latin, Swedish, and German by the age of 12.
• Nathan Leopold (1904–1971) started speaking at the age of four months; he reportedly had an IQ of 210, though this is not directly comparable to scores on modern IQ tests.
• Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463–1494) could speak 22 languages at the age of 18.
• Dorothea von Rodde-Schlözer (1770–1825) had mastered 9 languages by the age of 16; French, English, Dutch, Swedish, Italian, Latin, Spanish, Hebrew and Greek among other achievements.
• Thomas Young (scientist), more notable as a physicist, was a polyglot at a young age, who worked on translating Demotic Egyptian.
• William Wotton could read passages in English, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew at the age of five. Graduated from Cambridge aged thirteen having acquired Arabic, Syriac, Chaldee, French, Spanish and Italian, together with a good working knowledge of logic, philosophy, mathematics, geography, chronology, and history.

Sports

• Joy Foster represented Jamaica at table tennis at the Caribbean championships in Trinidad in 1958, aged only 8 years old. In the same year she won the Jamaican championship titles in Women's Singles (beating defending champion 20 year old Madge Bond in the final), Women's Doubles (paired with Madge Bond), and Mixed Doubles (paired with Fuarnado Roberts). Prior to this she had already won many local trophies. She went on to win the Caribbean women's singles title twice, and competed in the United States open championships on several occasions, winning various youth-level titles. In 1961 she was named the first Jamaican sportswoman of the year.
• Ariel Hsing, a ping pong prodigy
• Fu Mingxia (伏明霞) is a diver became the youngest world champion ever in any sport at age 12, and was an Olympic gold medalist at 13 years old.
• Jet Li (Chinese name: Li Lianjie (李连杰)) is a Chinese martial artist, who has won several gold medals in wushu at the All China Games at the age of 12.
• Sachin Tendulkar - Batsman (cricket). Made debut at the age of 16. In his early matches he hit Abdul Qadir, a prominent leg spinner of the time for 4 sixes in an over, hit a century at Perth, world's fastest pitch. Representing India for 21st year in International cricket. Has scored 100 international centuries, the first batsman to get 200* in ODI.
• Michelle Wie qualified for the USGA Women's Amateur Public Links at 10 years old and won the same event at 13 years old, making her the youngest person both to qualify for and win a USGA adult national championship.
• Wayne Gretzky was skating with 10-year-olds at six years old. By 10 years old, he scored 378 goals and 139 assists, in just 85 games, with the Nadrofsky Steelers.
• Tiger Woods was a child prodigy, introduced to golf before the age of two, by his athletic father Earl. In 1984 at the age of eight, he won the 9–10 boys' event, the youngest age group available, at the Junior World Golf Championships. He first broke 80 at age eight. He went on to win the Junior World Championships six times, including four consecutive wins from 1988 to 1991.
• Nadia Comăneci won 3 gold medals at 1976 Olympics and was the first female to achieve a perfect score of 10 in gymnastics at the age of 15.
• Ricky Rubio started his basketball career with DKV Joventut at the age of 14, becoming the youngest player to ever play in the Spanish ACB League, and played in the 2008 Summer Olympics at the age of 17 with eventual silver-medalists Spain, becoming the youngest ever to reach an Olympic basketball final.
• Guan Tianlang won the 2012 Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship in golf shortly after his 14th birthday. The following April, while still 14, he made the cut at the 2013 Masters Tournament, becoming the youngest male player ever to do so at a major championship.

Games

See also: Chess prodigy

4-year-old Capablanca and his father

• Garry Kasparov was a chess child prodigy who ranked in the top 15 players in the world at age 16 and is considered by many as the greatest chess player of all time. He became the World Chess Champion at the age of 22, the youngest of all time.
• Bobby Fischer won the United States Chess Championship at 14 years old and became, at the age of 15, the youngest Grandmaster in history at the time. He became the World Chess Champion in 1972.
• José Raúl Capablanca was one of the best chess players of all time.
• Cho Hunhyun was a professional go player at nine years old.
• Andy Costello, a chess prodigy who went on to become a chess boxer.
• Willie Mosconi, nicknamed "Mr. Pocket Billiards", played against professionals at six years old.
• Ronnie O'Sullivan, a snooker player, scored his first century break at 10 years old, his first maximum at 15 years old, and was the youngest-ever winner of a ranking event at 17 years old.
• Nicholas Patterson, a chess prodigy who went on to become a mathematician.
• Magnus Carlsen was, at the age of 13 years, 148 days, the second-youngest chess Grandmaster of all time (currently third-youngest) and also holds the records for the youngest player to break the 2700-Elo barrier (at the age of 16 years, 213 days) and the 2800-Elo barrier (at the age of 18 years, 336 days), and youngest player to be ranked No. 1 in the world by FIDE. His peak rating is 2872, the highest in history.
• Judit Polgár, a chess prodigy (and the strongest woman chess player in history) who became a chess Grandmaster at the age of 15 years and 4 months, the youngest of the time.
• Hou Yifan became the youngest female chess grandmaster at the age of 14 years and 6 months in 2008.
• Sergey Karjakin, a chess prodigy who holds the record for both the youngest International Master and the youngest Grandmaster. He has been rated as high as No. 4 in the world by FIDE.
• Carissa Yip, an American chess prodigy, became the youngest female chess expert (since the U.S. Chess Federation started electronically keeping records in 1991) at age nine in 2013.
• Irina Krush won the 1998 U.S. Women's Chess Championship at age 14 to become the youngest U.S. Women's Champion ever.
• Awonder Liang became the youngest chess expert in United States Chess Federation (USCF) history on April 16, 2011, when he played in the Hales Corners Challenge chess tournament in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with a rating of 2000 at the age of 8 years and 7 days. Awonder broke the earlier record by 64 days (which had been held by Samuel Sevian). On March 23, 2013, he became the youngest person ever to obtain a master's rating within the United States Chess Federation. Awonder was 17 days shy of his 10th birthday at the time of this achievement.

Legendary

This list consists of historic children, who have become representatives of the "prodigy" phenomenon, inspiring literature, but whose actual accomplishments have not been firmly established due to the poor sourcing or records of their eras.

• Gaon of Vilna was a historically significant rabbi who was called a prodigy in youth and who is said to have had a variety of skills by 11 years old.
• Christian Friedrich Heinecken (1721–1725) was a prodigy who could speak from an early age. By the time of his death was well-versed in mathematics, history and geography. He could speak Latin and French in addition to his native tongue.
• Okita Sōji (1842 or 1844–1868) was kenjutsu-(swordsmanship) prodigy, who defeated a kenjutsu master by 12 years old, became a master of kenjutsu and a school head (Jukutou) by 18 years old. He died from tuberculosis in his mid-twenties.

See also

• List of child prodigies in fiction
• Savantism

Further reading

• Hollingworth, Leta S. (1975). Children Above 180 IQ: Standford-Binet Origin and Development. New York: Arno Press. ISBN 0-405-06467-5.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link).
• Radford, John (1990). Child Prodigies and Exceptional Early Achievers. New York: Free Press. ISBN 0-02-925635-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link).
• Winner, Ellen (1996). Gifted Children: Myths and Realities. New York: Basic Books. ISBN 0-465-01759-2.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link).

External links

• The Origins and Ends of Giftedness by Ellen Winner
• Time Asia
• History of the education of gifted children by Ellen Summers