The
Catalog of the Tomash Library on the History of
Computing
The catalog of the Tomash Library provides information and illustrations from
about 3,000 of the oldest and rarest items in the collection. It is currently
available from two major institutions:
The Charles Babbage
Institute (http://www.cbi.umn.edu/hostedpublications/Tomash/index.htm
)
IEEE Computer Society
(http://www.computer.org/portal/web/tomash
)
Should either of these sites be
unavailable, it can be usually found by searching on each of their home pages
or by using a search engine with the terms “Tomash
Library” and “catalog” or similar identifiers.
Full text reproductions
of items from the Tomash Library
Thanks to the generosity of the Tomash family, we are pleased to present several full text
reproductions of very rare works from the Tomash
Library. These are cover-to-cover
scans presented in portable document
format (Adobe PDF). Many of these files are very large and thus we recommend a
high speed internet connection be used. Each pdf
document contains a section at the
beginning that details the bibliographic information about the document, some
items of interest about the author and the individual volume,
notes explaining old methods of
mathematics and computing that may otherwise make understanding the content
difficult, and other items that may be of interest. In addition
we have added notes on many pages
of the documents to try and make the document easier to read and/or more
interesting.
We have only created a few of
these full text files but intend to add more as time permits.
Click on any of the items below
to see the full text.
Macdonald,
William Rae; The construction of the
canon of logarithms,1889
The first English
edition of Napier’s second book about logarithms – how he constructed the
table.
Morland,
Samuel; The
description and use of two arithmetick instruments, 1673, London
Two arithmetic instruments, a text of arithmetic and an almanac
Napier,
John; Mirifici logarithmorum canonis constructi, 1619,
Edinburgh
Napier’s second work on logarithms
and how he constructed the table.
Napier, John; Mirifici logarithmorum canonis descriptio, 1614,
Edinburgh
Napier’s first
work on logarithms and the first published table of logarithms.
Napier,
John; A plaine discovery
of the whole revelation of Saint John, 1593, Edinburgh
Napier’s first published work
Napier, John; Rabdologiae,
1617, Edinburgh
Napier’s work in which he describes
Napier’s rods (Napier’s bones)
Napier-Wright;
Description of the admirable table of
logarithms, 1616
The first English edition of
Napier’s great work on logarithms
Oughtred, William [William Forster, translator], The
circles of proportion, 1632, London
The first edition (second issue) of Oughtred’s
description of his circular slide rule.
This
also contains descriptions of other instruments and applications in various
areas.
Oughtred, William, To
the English gentrie, 1633, London
Oughtred’s reply
to Richard Delamain’s claim to have invented the
slide rule.
Sacrobosco, Johannes de; Algorismus, 1523, Venice
An early text on arithmetic
(composed in the 13th century)
Sacrobosco, Johannes de; Spaerae mundi, 1488, Venice
An early text on
astronomy (composed in the 13th century)
The Catalog of the Tomash Library on the History of Computing The
catalog of the Tomash Library provides
information and illustrations from about 3,000 of the oldest and rarest
items in the collection. It is currently available from two major
institutions: The
Charles Babbage Institute (http://www.cbi.umn.edu/hostedpublications/Tomash/index.htm
) IEEE
Computer Society (http://www.computer.org/portal/web/tomash
) Should
either of these sites be unavailable, it can be easily found by using a search
engine with the terms “Tomash Library” and
“catalog” or similar identifiers. Full
text reproductions of items from the Tomash
Library Thanks
to the generosity of the Tomash family, we are
pleased to present several full text reproductions of very rare works from
the Tomash Library. These are cover-to-cover
scans presented in portable document format (Adobe PDF). Many of these
files are very large and thus we recommend a high speed internet connection
be used. Each pdf document contains a section at the
beginning that details the bibliographic information about the document,
some items of interest about the author and the individual volume, notes
explaining old methods of mathematics and computing that may otherwise make
understanding the content difficult, and other items that may be of
interest. In addition we have added notes on many pages of the documents to
try and make the document easier to read and/or more interesting. We
have only created a few of these full text files but intend to add more as
time permits. Click
on any of the items below to see the full text. Sacrobosco, Johannes de; Algorismus,
1523, Venice Sacrobosco, Johannes de; Spaerae mundi, 1488, Venice