First edition. Octavo. Bound in contemporary half calf over cloth-covered boards. A very good copy, rebacked. Old tape to upper hinge.
PROVENANCE: John S. Mackay (1843-1914), Scottish mathematician and founding member of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society, his bookplate to front pastedown; Herbert William Richmond FRS (1863-1948), Cambridge mathematician and Fellow of King’s College, presented to; C.M. Ross, a student of Richmond’s, who has inscribed on Mackay’s bookplate noting the gift.
The first edition of the first book of the mathematician Peter Barlow, in which he claims to give a proof of the general case of Fermat's Last Theorem.
While his proof alas contained an error, the book is still significant. In the the first book in English with "Theory of Numbers" in the title, and offers a good, brief history of Number Theory.
An Elementary Investigation Of The Theory Of Numbers
Author
Peter Barlow
Publisher
London: Printed for J. Johnson and Co.
Date
1811