Mathematical Treasure: John Collins’s Commercium Epistolicum

John Collins (1624–1683) was an English mathematics teacher who also worked as an accountant and the librarian of the Royal Society of London. He wrote several books on mathematics and accounting, and he was known for his correspondence with a variety of European mathematicians. This volume, Commercium Epistolicum, published in 1712—long after Collins’s death—contains letters and papers from his estate that document Newton’s priority over Leibniz in discovering the infinitesimal calculus.        

This image shows the copy offered for sale in 2010 by Heritage Auctions. A copy sold by Martayan Lan has an extensive historical description.

Index to Mathematical Treasures