High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Dwarfs standing on the shoulders of giants (Latin: nanos gigantium humeris insidentes) is a Western metaphor meaning "One who develops future intellectual pursuits by understanding the research and works created by notable thinkers of the past," a contemporary interpretation. However, the metaphor was first recorded in the twelfth century and attributed to Bernard of Chartres. It was famously uttered by seventeenth-century scientist Isaac Newton (see below). The picture is derived from the Greek mythology where the blind giant Orion carried his servant Cedalion on his shoulders.