Ramus Amongst the Jesuits? A Historiographical Inquiry into the Appearance of an Early Ramist Mathematical Text at the Irish College of Salamanca

ThisRamus, Petrus chapterCatholicism, Jesuit Order approachesSalamanca, Irish College theTracey, Kevin Russell Library’sMaynooth, Russell Library copy of Petrus Ramus’s EuclidesRamus, Euclides (1545) diachronically, combining evidence from the 1558 edition’s intellectual and material construction with an exploration of its biography and subsequent use. Firstly, Euclides is located as a work whose text and paratexts were part of a vibrant mathematical culture as well as a longer lineage of EuclideanEuclidean geometry adaptations. The edition’s later appearance in an institution overseen by the Society of Jesus then affords both a review of the role attributed to introductory mathematics in competing early modern pedagogical and methodological endeavours, and a means to engage with the novice, early modern readers who encountered such strategies and their attendant texts.