Fundamentals of Arithmetic; Fundamentals of Music

VII PREFACE.

In the spelling of words, if it seems to anyone that I am not entirely consistent—because they will find printed supponenda things to be assumed and obtinet obtains, inpar odd/unequal and comparare to compare, adsumo to take to and aspicere to look at, and other things of this kind—let him remember that I have followed the most varied manuscripts in this matter and could not reach anything more than what is most likely 7). Although I was as intent as possible on rendering the same word with the same letters everywhere, I could not prevent some errors from escaping my notice. Some things also varied as my opinion changed with new arguments. I ask that these be considered corrected according to the spelling used in the index.. Only in the case of one space did I keep the letter t, against the almost unwilling manuscripts, and rejected the c which occurs most frequently. In Greek proper names, I preferred to follow the Greek method of writing, from which it seems that Ptolomaeus Ptolemy itself should be written. Since the books on geometry seem to me to be attributed to a later time, I did not change them even if they differed in some respects from the other books of Boethius. And I do not know if I have tried to be more constant in correcting the works of Boethius than Boethius himself was, since not only does the great variety of expressing the same thoughts testify that he loved the variation of things, but it is also highly likely that he wrote indiscriminately triangulus and triangulum triangle, pyramidam and pyramidem pyramid, atomon in Latin letters, and κoλoυρον truncated/frustum in Greek letters, and similar things.

I have included in brackets what is read on page 375, verses 1, 2, 18, and 19; nor does it escape me that other things could also be included, such as page 383, vv. 5–21, page 387, v. 23, and page 388, vv. 1–2. But those places are too corrupt to be cured by brackets. On page 401, v. 10, after longitudine length, a lacuna must be established. For it has fallen away...