B chapter.indd - Charles Babbage Institute - University of Minnesota

For obvious reasons, calculating prodigies have
always been of interest to the developers of computing
machinery. This 1952 (first U.S.) edition incorporates a
few corrections not present in the 1951 (first English)
edition. The opening third of the work discusses famous
calculating prodigies such as Zerah Colburn and describes
some of the feats they could perform. The rest of the book
is devoted to a discussion of these, and related, abilities.
The distinction is drawn between calculating prodigies
(often referred to as idiot savants) and people trained in
mental calculation either for use in their work or as stage
performers. The latter part of the book contains various
algorithms used by those trained in the art.
106
Illustrations available:
Title page
B 92
Barlow, Peter (1776–1862)
An elementary investigation of the theory of numbers,
with its application to the indeterminate and
Diophantine analysis, the analytical and geometrical
division of the circle, and several other curious
algebraical and arithmetical problems.
Year: 1811
Place: London
Publisher: J. Johnson and Co.
Edition: 1st
Language: English
Binding: modern leather half bound over marbled boards
Pagination: pp. xvi, 507, [3]
Collation: A–2I 8 2K 7
Size: 217x133 mm
Erwin Tomash Library
Barlow, Peter Barnard, Francis Pierrepont
B 92
Barlow was a mathematician at the Royal Military
Academy in England. He was self-educated and initially
made his reputation through an essay concerned with
timber stresses based on research he had done at the
Woolwich arsenal. He is best know today for his
association with a specific type of telescope eyepiece
(the Barlow lens), which he designed in the late 1820s,
and for his mathematical tables (Barlow’s Tables) which
remained in print until after World War II.
This volume is highly technical work on number theory.
It begins with a discussion of the number philosophy of
Pythagoras and proceeds to discuss primes, continued
fractions, quadratic equations and other topics, often in
relation to problems or theories first developed by the
Greeks.
Illustrations available:
Title page
B 93
Barlow, Peter (1776–1862)
A treatise on the manufactures and machinery of Great
Britain … To which is prefaced, an introductory view
of the principles of manufactures by Charles Babbage.
Forming a portion of the Encyclopaedia Metropolitana.
3 vols.
Year: 1836
Place: London
Publisher: Baldwin and Braddock
Edition: 2nd
Language: English
Figures: 87 engraved plates bound at end of v.3
Binding: contemporary leather
Pagination: v.1, pp. iii–viii, 412; v.2, pp. 413–828; v.3, pp.
829–834
Collation: v.1, π 3 B–L 4 M 2 N–3G 4 ; v.2, 3H–5N 4 ; v.3, 5O 3
Size: 274x208 mm
See Babbage, Charles; An introductory view of the
principles of manufactures, 1836
Illustrations available:
None
B 94
Barnard, Francis Pierrepont (1854–1931)
The casting-counter and the counting board. A chapter
in the history of numismatics and early arithmetic.
Year: 1916
Place: Oxford
Publisher: Clarendon Press
Edition: 1st
Language: English
Figures: 64 plates (numbered 1–46, 47a, 47b, 48–63)