ABSTRACT
I used to love mathematics for its own sake, and I still do, because it allows for no hypocrisy and no vagueness, my two beˆtes noires.
Henri Beyle Stendhal (1783-1842), French novelist
In this introductory chapter, we introduce algebraic number theory with a concentration on quadratic fields. We begin with a general look at number fields. The reader should be familiar with the concepts in a course in number theory contained in [68] to which we will refer when needed.
