Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book addresses the questions from a variety of perspectives, deploying evidence ranging from micro-historical studies of specific artefacts to wider-ranging surveys of milieus, corpora, and libraries. It examines the reading of learned and classic mathematical texts, including those of Euclid and Tycho. The book considers the reading of mathematical diagrams in a broader perspective, discussing the changes in the nature and function of diagrams in Euclidean print which took place across the early modern period. It also addresses mathematics in the English universities in the seventeenth century. The book offers a close and insightful reading of the several layers of annotation on the copy found in the Whipple Museum in Cambridge of Leonard Digges’ Pantometria, a text which itself is characterized by a multi-layered, multi-author texture and a plurality of voices.