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Capitalism and Arithmetic: The New Math of the 15th Century, Including the Full Text of the Treviso Arithmetic of 1478, Translated by David Eugene Smith
by Frank Swetz
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Open Court Pub Co (1986-01)
ISBN: 0875484387
EAN: 9780875484389
Dewey Decimal #: 510.9024
Hardcover: 376 pages
SKU: 6AB1-084-7-0708
Condition: VG+ VG+
Comments: Clean copy, no markings by previous owners; Dust jacket shows very slight shelfwear; Very little age-toning; Tight copy. *International Buyers Welcome!* (except for prohibitively heavy items, as noted) - Satisfied customers in over 40 countries! We ship quickly and guarantee satisfaction. Your purchase helps support a U. Chicago student
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Customer Reviews
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An Historian's Delight
Rating  (3)
Date: 2008-10-16
Capitalism & Arithmetic is strictly for the serious student of the Renaissance and early European arithmetic. Frank Swetz brings forth a fine description/translation of what is the earliest known textbook, by author unknown, in a 1478 book entitled the Treviso Arithmetic. Treviso was a small town north of Venice Italy in the 15th C that was on one of the main trade routes out of Italy. The merchants of Venice were developing trade and, needing a convenient mathematics, introducing the Hindu-Arabic number system and many computational techniques. The Treviso Arithmetic is a textbook for young merchants to introduce them to the mathematics they will need to carry on trade. I gained a much deepen appreciation for the enormity of what we have inherited from the past that was so hard-won and of such lasting value.
Dennis Riness
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Early history of business and computational science
Rating  (4)
Date: 1999-02-24
2 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
The advent of Hindu/Arabic numbers in Europe made possible "algorithmic" calculation. Math schools were established where parents sent their sons to prepare for jobs with merchants, where ability to calculate was a requirement. Curiously, there were many different ways of setting up problems for solution with pencil and paper, and only later on did we agree on the standard "algorithms" for addition, subtraction, etc. that are now taught to children. The ability to compute proportionality, the basis of the money changer's art, was regarded as amazing.
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