The Works of Euclid, Vol. 1

PREFACE.

Perhaps it may be said that the only difference existing between the method of Euclid and that of Archimedes consists in the rejection or admission of the postulates about which the discussion arises here.

In the preface to my version of books 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 11, and 12 of the Elements of Euclid, which was published in the year 1804, I undertook the task of editing versions of the complete works of Euclid, Archimedes, and Apollonius. My version of the works of Archimedes was published in the year 1808; at which time, indeed, I had applied the finishing touches to the translation of the works of Euclid. But before it was submitted to the press, I wished to consult the manuscript codices of the Imperial Library regarding many passages which appeared to me mutilated or corrupt in the Oxford edition, which I had used in translating Euclid. These codices, twenty-three in number, were entrusted to me, and I immediately noticed that the Oxford edition was not a copy of any of these manuscripts; that these manuscripts all filled the lacunae and restored the corrupt passages in the Basel edition and in the Oxford edition, which is nothing other than its copy. Furthermore, I noticed that all these manuscripts, with the exception only of manuscript 190, were almost in agreement with one another; manuscript 190, however, filled the lacunae and restored the corrupt passages which were neither filled nor restored with the aid of the other manuscripts.

Manuscript 190 belonged to the Vatican Library: it was sent from Rome to Paris by the Count de Peluse.

In the Greek manuscript 2348, copied toward the end of the sixteenth century, and which contains the Data of Euclid collated with five of the most ancient Greek Vatican manuscripts by Giuseppe Auria, a celebrated geometer, you would not find even one of the most precious variant readings of manuscript 190; which seems to prove that this manuscript was missing from the Vatican library at that time.

Manuscript 190 bears all the marks of manuscripts copied at the end of the ninth century; the other manuscripts, however, belong to much more recent centuries.

Having had this manuscript entrusted to me, it immediately occurred to me to edit the Elements and the Data—undoubtedly the only works of Euclid that survive—in Greek, Latin, and French.