Eric Chaim Kline, Bookseller

Osnovania Geometrii: Rukovodstvo sostavlennoe dlia gemnaziy [The Essentials of Geometry: a guide created for gymnasiums]

Busse, Feodor

Moscow: Ministerstvo Narodnogo Prosveschenia [The Ministry of Public Enlightenment], 1867. Fourth edition. Hardcover. 8vo. 192pp. Half-leather over decorative paper-covered boards. A geometry textbook created for use in gymnasiums, by Feodor Ivanovich Busse, a leading figure in the development of state educational curriculum in the Russian Empire during the 19th century. Busse published the first edition of the guide in 1844, while working as the director of St. Petersburg's 3rd gymnasium, a school that eventually would count Nabokov, Marshak, and Mravinsky among its alumni. The gymnasiums were the elite educational institutions in the Russian Empire, attended for the most part by young nobles, and personally overseen by the Tsar, Alexander II at the time. Busse's guide is designed to meet the high expectations of the Tsar's curriculum. The textbook is divided into two parts, "'Lines and Planes," and "Bodies," and each part is subdivided into several chapters, outlining explanations of axioms and theorems, and presenting a total of 558 problems, with some solutions at the end of each chapter. At the end of the volume are 8 foldout diagram sheets, depicting numerous geometric bodies. Text in Russian. Front board detached, but present. Leather binding peeled along spine, boards rubbed and scuffed, corners bumped. Some foxing and pencil marks to interior. Overall in fair condition. fair. Item #22717

Price: $950.00