New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1903-11-25
" MATHEMATICAL EXHIBIT.
Il Collection Not by Any Means as
interesting as 1t Sounds.


Few things on earth sound worse than
mathematical exhibit. The ordinary unacademic
mortal would rather pay a fine than go to
Yet only a few minutes necessary to convince
the visitor the mathematical exhibit which
opened on Monday at the Educational Museum OF
Teachers College that there is responsiveness,
deep human interest one might almost say
romance about the history and literature Of mathe-
mates here presented. The exhibition. which
has been arranged in connection with the meet
lngs OF the Association OF Colleges and Preparatory
Schools. and the Association of Teachers of Mathe
mates in the Middle States and Maryland. at
Teachers College this week will be open daily.
except Thursday, from a. m to p. m. through
the week. and perhaps longer.
The exhibition includes 300 rare portraits of
famous mathematcians and 100 autOgra phs OF IA
nous mathematcians. all lent by Professor David
eugene Smith. Of Teachers College; about forty
rare manuscripts and early editions lent b. George
- 1l4ilpton; some valuable early American BOOKS
on arithmetic from the library of Columbia Uni
Eersltyi ancient and modern computing machines,
from the swanpan OF the Chinese laundryman to
the modern machine which will add columns
thousand ngures long with one turn Of the crank,
and a number Of interesting educational devices
Inc Oldest manuscript in the exhibition is
specimen OF the first Latin edition Of Euclid. the
WORK Of Campanus. Bishop OF Jerusalem. who
translated It about 1860 from the Arabic. 1t is
vellum, beautifully Illuminated An arithmetic by
bouus made about fifteen years later. is of
the gems Of the exhibit. with its diagrams done
beautifully on vellum in colors.
Arithmetic. 10 the ancient and medieval mind.
meant something very different from the modern
business arithmetic which enables
pute MS years profits and woman her annual
ofess expenditure. II consisted OF the theory of
numbers AS for algebra when a student in the
middle ages attempted solve a algebraic prob
lem, be found himself without the plus and minus
signs without the sign OF equality. without any
symbols such X. for expressing unknown guam
uties He wrote everything out. His results he
oh -uF.
been handed down for generations. the meaning OF
which only few scholars understood
The first English Euclid dates from 1870 and
its title page one reads that it is Faithfully Cno
frsO translated into the English and mechanical.
until these daies. greatly missed"
One OF the most interesting manuscripts. on &C
count OF the curious picture It contains OF mas
ter teaching his pupil arithmetic, is copy Of Sacro
bOscus Algorsmus, written in 1444 by a German
student There is the pupil. there is the desk and
seat, and there Is the teacher. looking ninatory
and hortatory in his flowing gown. The master
points his victim a hornbook the wall, on
which in white all the Arabic numerals,
with the exception OF zero. which had been in
vented q time. A hornbook, by the way,
z tablet which the alphabet. the numerals. the
Lords Prayer and so on were inscribed then COW
books were used by American forefathers when
hornbook extant dates from 1925 yet it nearly
a century earlier that this German student painted
as S he most likely called it. his aigorismus
For although arithmetic is + ancient, the name
arithmetic is comparatively modern The way
arithmetic happened to by the name OF an algO-
riscus like this; Up to the year 1850 Roman
numerals were employed universally throughout
Europe and il followed naturally enough that the
abacus. logfptic. or arithmetica- But about 800
A d. there lived at Bagdad a mathematician called
Al khowarizmi who wrote book in which he en-
ployed Arabic numerals This book translated
into Latin about 1880 and. becoming tremendously
popular the universities Of Europe, it drove
out the Roman numerals and with them the classic
titles for the treatise dealing with their The
abacus had evolved into the algorismus.
Not without emotion does the visitor. mindful Of
his struggles with that would do
upon the first arithmetic ever printed-an in
covers. but rare that even the British Museum
does not copy. Very also is the book
dating from 1891 in which for the first time long
division. worked out in the modern form, is
printed To how colossal a discovery this-to
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS in its day note the
sum in division done in galley form in the arth-
mefiC by HOnoratus. a monk. about 1900. In which
the division is done by scratching out. and
make the galley form more conspicuous the |
student the outline Of ship has been drawn
around the with pennOns and rigging, TO
make the similitude more marked
Not less interesting Is IL to in a volume pub
lshed in Nuremberg in 1915 the first solution ever
printed Of cube root. One feels If he had been
present the birth Of n world.
No visitor to the exhibition would willingly slight
the portraits Of famous mathematcians the inter
est Of which lies much In their artistic as their
mathematical value Professor Smiths collection !
includes one thousand OF these prints and repre |
sents years Of collecting.