Teaching Elementary Mathematics at the University of Prague: A Study of Latin Compendia from the Second Half of the 18^th century

From the middle of the 18^th century on, the central authority in Vienna strove to increase its control over education in the Habsburg lands, attempting to introduce a series of reforms in university education in order to modernize the curricula in lower and higher educational institutions, institutions in which the influence of the Jesuits was predominant until the Society of Jesus’s suppression by the Pope in 1773. A consequence of these reforms was that the teaching of mathematics changed significantly in Habsburg territories between circa 1750 and 1784.

In this paper, we shall survey the content and structure of the course in Elementary Mathematics at the Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague. The teaching of mathematics at this college, which is fairly well documented, represents a fruitful case study for assessing the circulation of modern ideas in mathematical teaching. These ideas were promoted by contemporary authors like Christian Wolff or Nicolas Louis de la Caille, and were assimilated by the local scholarly community.

Since the present study represents no more than a preliminary exploration, our survey will cover only the period running from circa 1750 up to the year 1784. The terminus a quo here marks the publication of the first compendia written by a Jesuit professor from Prague and the terminus ad quem marks the end of Latin as the language of higher education. The switch to German as the official language of teaching introduced important changes, such as the adoption of new German textbooks and the end of Jesuit cultural hegemony even in scientific writings.