Introduction

The foundation of dynamics as a science of motion was laid down by Newton through the publication of his most referred (and least read) book Principia. In England this branch was continued to be followed; the basic character of the subject was based upon ‘vector mechanics’ since most of the relevant quantities like momentum, force and acceleration were all vector quantities. Furthermore, it should be remembered that this mechanics considered the interaction of forces with only particles, i.e., point-like objects. Thus, another title with which Newtonian mechanics was referred to was ‘point mechanics’. The study of motion of particles (point-like objects) subjected to systems of forces remained as the basic purpose of Newtonian mechanics. It is thus obvious that the important parameters are of vectorial nature.