Elementary arithmetic, with brief notices of its history... by Robert Potts.

INTRODUCTION.

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public libraries of Europe, and some are preserved in the libraries of
Oxford and Cambridge. In many of them is explained the Arabic
method of notation, which would seem to show that the writers of the
almanacks were using a notation requiring explanation, and differing
from the Roman characters then in use. In the calendars of the latter
part of the fifteenth century the explanations of the Arabic notation had
ceased to appear.
Lucas Pacioli, or Lucas de Burgo, appears to have taught the sciences
of algorithm and algebra at Venice about the year 1460, and to have
noticed the names of men who had been his predecessors. In the year
1494 he published at Venice his "Summa de Arithmetica," the first
work which was printed on the subject, and in 1525 a more complete
form of it. This was his principal work. He professes to have consulted
the earlier writers, Euclid, Sacro Bosco, Leonardo of Pisa, and others.
The work itself treats of arithmetic, algebra, and geometry. In the
first part he explains the properties of numbers and rules of the arithmetic of commerce, and gives an account of the principles of keeping
merchants' accounts by double entry, afterwards called the Italian
method. He also explains the rules of interest, exchange, barter, &c.
The "Summa de Arithmetica " was not printed till more than half
a century after the invention of printing. The history of arithmetic
and other sciences is almost entirely the history of books and manuscripts which treat on these subjects, with very little of contemporaneous
history to show how extensive or otherwise was the knowledge of these
sciences.
Cuthbert Tonstall was born in 1476, and studied first at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and afterwards -at Padua. Erasmus
and Tonstall were firm friends. Sir Thomas More, in a letter to
Erasmus, wrote of Tonstall: As there was no man more adorned
with knowledge and good literature, no man more severe and of greater
integrity for his life and manners, so there was no man a more sweet
and pleasant companion, with whom a man would rather choose to
converse."
The work, " De Arte Supputandi," composed by Cuthbert Tonstall,
was published in 1522. In his dedication to Sir Thomas More he professes to have read all the books that had ever been written on the
subject. Professor De Morgan remarks: " This book was a farewell to
the sciences, on the author's appointment to the See of London, and is
decidedly the most classical which was- ever written on the subject in
Latin, both in purity of style and in goodness of matter. For plain
common sense, well expressed, and learning most visible in the habits
it had formed, Tonstall's book has been rarely surpassed, and never in
the subject of which it treats."
Robert Recorde was educated at Oxford, and elected Fellow of All
Souls' College in 1531, where he appears to have zealously promoted
the study of the mathematical sciences. In 1545 he was admitted to
the degree of M.D. at Cambridge, where he taught arithmetic and
other parts of mathematical science. His published writings prove
him to have been no common man, and he is thus acknowledged by the
contains the following account of the Arabic notation: —"Nota quod qumlibet
figura algorismi in prillo loco signat se ipsam, et in secundo decies se. Tertio loco,
centies se ipsam. Quarto loco, millesies se. Quinto loco, decies millesies se. Sexto
loco, centies millesies se. Septimo loco, mille nillesies se. Et semper incipiendum
est computare a parte sinistra."