MOIVRE, Abraham de (1667--1754)
The doctrine of chances: or, a method of calculating the probability of events in play. The third edition, fuller, clearer, and more correct than the former. By A. De Moivre, ...
London: printed for A. Millar, 1756.
[4], xi, [1], 348 p. : [3] etch. illus., tables ; 29.2 cm. (4º)

First published in 1718 in an edition dedicated to Sir Isaac Newton; the second and third editions have a dedication to Lord Carpenter. A key work by the father of probability theory in which major steps in the measurement of uncertainty were achieved, and the first systematic treatment of probability in English. Abraham de Moivre became, with Edmund Halley, a founder of English actuarial science. Born in France, De Moivre received a varied education and settled in London as a Huguenot refugee in 1688. For a detailed discussion of De Moivre's Doctrine of Chances, see S.M. Stigler, The history of statistics: the measurement of uncertainty before 1900 (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, 1986), especially pp. 71--88. Includes 'A Treatise Of Annuities On Livres: ...', p. [261]--328). The illustrations are a title-page vignette portrait of De Moivre, and etched head- and tail-pieces. ESTC t33063.

Copy Notes Probably the copy bought for 13s. from John Cumming together with Thucydides (q.v.), Polybius (q.v.), Hooke's Roman history (q.v.) and Murphy's Tacitus (q.v.) for a total of £9 9s. on 16 September 1801. (Journal 4, p. 369). Bookseller's cyphers in pencil on front free-endpaper.

Binding C18th sprinkled calf, gilt-ruled spine, red morocco spine-label.

Reference Number 499