This classic study notes the origin of a mathematical symbol, the competition it encountered, its spread among writers in different countries, its rise to popularity, and its eventual decline or ultimate survival. 1929 edition.

This comprehensive study traces the historic development of division in extreme and mean ratio ("the golden number") from its first appearance in Euclid's Elements through the 18th century. Features numerous illustrations.

Educator and reformer Peter Ramus (1515-72) was known for his rash assaults on the most esteemed and cherished foundations of religion and learning in France. As a leading figure in both the French Reform and the University of Paris, and author of the pedagogical system known as "Ramism," he consistently promoted an ideology which would make status, influence, and authority dependent on talent and achievement, instead of on birth or wealth. His social ideal attracted a sizeable following and achieved some practical results during his lifetime, but after his death his reforms collapsed. In their place arose the hierarchical, oligarchic, and authoritarian society of Old Regime France. Skalnik presents fresh and solid research in this well-written volume.

Hailed as one of the greatest mathematical results of the twentieth century, the recent proof of Fermat's Last Theorem by Andrew Wiles brought to public attention the enigmatic problem-solver Pierre de Fermat, who centuries ago stated his famous conjecture in a margin of a book, writing that he did not have enough room to show his "truly marvelous demonstration." Along with formulating this proposition--xn+yn=zn has no rational solution for n > 2--Fermat, an inventor of analytic geometry, also laid the foundations of differential and integral calculus, established, together with Pascal, the conceptual guidelines of the theory of probability, and created modern number theory. In one of the first full-length investigations of Fermat's life and work, Michael Sean Mahoney provides rare insight into the mathematical genius of a hobbyist who never sought to publish his work, yet who ranked with his contemporaries Pascal and Descartes in shaping the course of modern mathematics.