Jacques Sesiano – författare

'This text should not be viewed as a comprehensive history of algebra before 1600, but as a basic introduction to the types of problems that illustrate the earliest forms of algebra. It would be particularly useful for an instructor who is looking for examples to help enliven a course on elementary algebra with problems drawn from actual historical texts' - Warren Van Egmond about the French edition for ""MathSciNet"". This book does not aim to give an exhaustive survey of the history of algebra up to early modern times but merely to present some significant steps in solving equations and, wherever applicable, to link these developments to the extension of the number system. Various examples of problems, with their typical solution methods, are analyzed, and sometimes translated completely. Indeed, it is another aim of this book to ease the reader's access to modern editions of old mathematical texts, or even to the original texts; to this end, some of the problems discussed in the text have been reproduced in the appendices in their original language (Greek, Latin, Arabic, Hebrew, French, German, Provencal, and Italian) with explicative notes.

This edition of Books IV to VII of Diophantus' Arithmetica, which are extant only in a recently discovered Arabic translation, is the outgrowth of a doctoral dissertation submitted to the Brown University Department of the History of Mathematics in May 1975. Early in 1973, my thesis adviser, Gerald Toomer, learned of the existence of this manuscript in A. Gulchln-i Macanl's just-published catalogue of the mathematical manuscripts in the Mashhad Shrine Library, and secured a photographic copy of it. In Sep­ tember 1973, he proposed that the study of it be the subject of my dissertation. Since limitations of time compelled us to decide on priorities, the first objective was to establish a critical text and to translate it. For this reason, the Arabic text and the English translation appear here virtually as they did in my thesis. Major changes, however, are found in the mathematical com­ mentary and, even more so, in the Arabic index. The discussion of Greek and Arabic interpolations is entirely new, as is the reconstruction of the history of the Arithmetica from Diophantine to Arabic times. It is with the deepest gratitude that I acknowledge my great debt to Gerald Toomer for his constant encouragement and invaluable assistance.

An investigation into the predecessors of the magic cube.Magic cubes are generally considered to have been invented in the second half of the nineteenth century, when the conditions for a cube to be called magic were established: it must display the same sum in each horizontal, vertical, and front-to-back row, as well as in the four internal diagonals of the cube.However, during the preceding seven centuries, constructions of magic cubes had already begun, but obeying other definitions. The first study is found in twelfth-century Persia. Then, Pierre de Fermat (1601-1665) dealt with them in the seventeenth century. Unaware of the existence of predecessors and with a different design, the Frenchman Joseph Sauveur (1653-1716) taught a construction method that was adopted in Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz’s (1646-1716) circle. This method was expanded in the 1830s but fell into oblivion with the modern definition of the magic cube.

The science of magic squares witnessed an important development in the Islamic world during the Middle Ages, with a great variety of construction methods being created and ameliorated.

The science of magic squares witnessed an important development in the Islamic world during the Middle Ages, with a great variety of construction methods being created and ameliorated.

The Liber mahameleth is a work in Latin written in the mid-12th century based (mainly) on Arabic sources from Islamic Spain. It is now our principal source on mathematics in Islamic Spain at that time; There are few extant Arabic texts and no one is as complete as the LM. It is also the second largest mathematical work from the Latin Middle Ages (the other is by Fibonacci, some 50 years later).Since the three main manuscripts preserving it are incomplete and there are many scribal errors, a reliable Latin text has been established, which reports (in notes) the various readings of the manuscripts and the errors in them. This is how a so-called critical edition is made. This edition of the Latin text is preceded by General Introduction, describing the various manuscripts, the content of the work and what we know about its author.Part Two of the volume is a translation of the text and ends with a glossary of Latin terms. The glossary will be of great importance for the knowledge of Latin scientific terms from that time, since there is no other mathematical text of this size from the 12th century. Part Three begins with a short introduction and then analyzes all the problems from the text, with a summary of the mathematical methods involved in each chapter. The commentary is a companion to the translation and explains the author's solving methods.

The Liber mahameleth is a work in Latin written in the mid-12th century based (mainly) on Arabic sources from Islamic Spain. It is now our principal source on mathematics in Islamic Spain at that time; There are few extant Arabic texts and no one is as complete as the LM. It is also the second largest mathematical work from the Latin Middle Ages (the other is by Fibonacci, some 50 years later).Since the three main manuscripts preserving it are incomplete and there are many scribal errors, a reliable Latin text has been established, which reports (in notes) the various readings of the manuscripts and the errors in them. This is how a so-called critical edition is made. This edition of the Latin text is preceded by General Introduction, describing the various manuscripts, the content of the work and what we know about its author.Part Two of the volume is a translation of the text and ends with a glossary of Latin terms. The glossary will be of great importance for the knowledge of Latin scientific terms from that time, since there is no other mathematical text of this size from the 12th century. Part Three begins with a short introduction and then analyzes all the problems from the text, with a summary of the mathematical methods involved in each chapter. The commentary is a companion to the translation and explains the author's solving methods.

This volume contains the texts and translations of two Arabic treatises on magic squares, which are undoubtedly the most important testimonies on the early history of that science.