Page:A history of Japanese mathematics (IA historyofjapanes00smitiala).pdf/8

IV brought together most of the European literature upon the subject and embodied it in a series of lectures for my classes in the history of mathematics, I welcomed the suggestion of Dr. Carus that I join with Mr. Mikami in the preparation of the present work. Mr. Mikami has already made for himself an enviable reputation as an authority upon the wasan or native Japanese mathematics, and his contributions to the Bibliotheca Mathematica have attracted the attention of western scholars. He has also published, as a volume of the Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der Mathematik, a work entitled Mathematical Papers from the Far East. Moreover his labors with the learned T. Endō, the greatest of the historians of Japanese mathematics, and his consequent familiarity with the classics of his country, eminently fit him for a work of this nature.

Our labors have been divided in the manner that the circumstances would suggest. For the European literature, the general planning of the work, and the final writing of the text, the responsibility has naturally fallen to a considerable extent upon me. For the furnishing of the Japanese material, the initial translations, the scholarly search through the excellent library of the Academy of Sciences of Tokio, where Mr. Endô is librarian, and the further examination of the large amount of native secondary material, the responsibility has been Mr. Mikami's. To his scholarship and indefatigable labors I am indebted for more material than could be used in this work, and whatever praise our efforts may merit should be awarded in large measure to him.

The aim in writing this work has been to give a brief survey of the leading features in development of the wasan. It has not seemed best to enter very fully into the details of demonstration or into the methods of solution employed by the great writers whose works are described. This would not be done in a general history of European mathematics, and there is no reason why it should be done here, save in cases the where some peculiar feature is under discussion. Undoubtedly several names of importance have been omitted, and at least a score of names that might properly have had mention have