This volume contains a historically sensitive analysis and interpretation of Apollonius of Perga's Conica, one of the greatest works of Hellenistic mathematics. It provides a long overdue alternative to H. G. Zeuthen's Die Lehre von den Kogelschnitten im Altertum.

A first English translation of Book IV of Apollonius's Conics, translated and annotated by Michael N. Fried, as a companion volume to our edition of Conics Books I-III. Conics IV deals with the way pairs of conic sections can intersect or touch each other. In his Introduction to the translation, Fried shows that this book has been misappraised by scholars too much inclined to see Apollonius's work merely as a precursor to the analytic geometry of the seventeenth century. He writes, Playfulness is one of the real delights of Book IV. One can see in this playfulness the artful way Apollonius contends with the main challenge of the book -the problem of how the opposite sections, specifically, meet other sections of a cone and other opposite sections - how he gives this problem both foundation and context."

This book considers how languages, peoples and cultures in the Near East interacted over the millennium between Alexander and Muhammad.

In 451 CE the Council of Chalcedon was called to assert the preeminence of orthodox Catholic doctrine against the heresy of men who refused what we now refer to as the Definition of Faith, or the belief in Jesus Christ as both man and divine spirit during his lifetime. This book is suitable for scholars studying this period.

It will also prove useful for those investigating the relationship between Biblical covenant theology and its possible antecedents in older Near Eastern treaty patterns."--BOOK JACKET.