History of calculus or infinitesimal calculus, is a history of a mathematical discipline focused

on limits, functions, derivatives, integrals, and infinite series. Isaac Newton and Gottfried Leibniz independently

invented calculus in the mid-17th century. A rich history and cast of characters participating in the development
of calculus both preceded and followed the contributions of these singular individuals.

 Nothing in Descartes' work led directly to Leibniz's calculus, but Descartes' discoveries in mathematics
were certainly forerunners of the calculus.
We know that in 1661... Newton read books about Descartes' mathematics. ...without Descartes' unification of
algebra and geometry it would have been impossible to describe graphs using mathematical equations, and
hence, except perhaps as a pure theory, the calculus would be completely devoid of meaning.
o Amir Aczel, Descartes’ Secret Notebook (2005)

 In Sorbière's day, European thinkers and intellectuals of widely divergent religious and political
affiliations campaigned tirelessly to stamp out the doctrine of indivisibles and to eliminate it from philosophical
and scientific consideration. In the very years that Hobbes was fighting Wallis over the indivisible line in
England, the Society of Jesus was leading its own campaign against the infinitely small in Catholic lands. In
France, Hobbes's acquaintance René Descartes, who had initially shown considerable interest in infinitesimals,
changed his mind and banned the concept.. Even as late as the 1730s... George Berkeley mocked
mathematicians for their use of infinitesimals... Lined up against these naysayers were some of the most
prominent mathematicians and philosophers of that era, who championed the use of the infinitesimally small.
These included, in addition to Wallis: Galileo and his followers, Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, and Isaac
Newton.
o Amir Alexander, Infinitesimal: How a Dangerous Mathematical Theory Shaped the Modern
World (2014)

 On the one side were ranged the forces of hierarchy and order—Jesuits, Hobbesians, French Royal
Courtiers, and High Church Anglicans. They believed in a unified and fixed order in the world, both natural and
human, and were fiercely opposed to infinitesimals. On the other side were comparative "liberalizers" such
as Galileo, Wallis, and the Newtonians. They believed in a more pluralistic and flexible order, one that might
accommodate a range of views and diverse centers of power, and championed infinitesimals and their use in
mathematics. The lines were drawn, and a victory for one side or the other would leave its imprint on the world
for centuries to come.
o Amir Alexander, Infinitesimal: How a Dangerous Mathematical Theory Shaped the Modern
World (2014)

 [Joseph-Louis Lagrange's] lectures on differential calculus form the basis of his Theorie des fonctions
analytiques which was published in 1797. ...its object is to substitute for the differential calculus a group of
theorems based upon the development of algebraic functions in series. A somewhat similar method had been
previously used by John Landen in his Residual Analysis... Lagrange believed that he could... get rid of those
difficulties, connected with the use of infinitely large and infinitely small quantities, to which philosophers
objected in the usual treatment of the differential calculus. ...Another treatise in the same lines was his Leçons
sur le calcul des fonctions, issued in 1804. These works may be considered as the starting-point for the
researches of Cauchy, Jacobi, and Weierstrass.
o W. W. Rouse Ball, A Short Account of the History of Mathematics (1912)

 Nothing is easier... than to fit a deceptively smooth curve to the discontinuities of mathematical
invention. Everything then appears as an orderly progression... with Cavalieri, for instance, indistinguishable
from Newton in the neighborhood of the calculus, or Lagrange from Fourier in that of trigonometric series,
or Bhaskara from Lagrange in the region of Fermat's equation. Professional historians may sometimes be
inclined to overemphasize the smoothness of the curve; professional mathematicians, mindful of the dominant
 part played in geometry by the singularities of curves, attend to the discontinuities. ...That such differences
should exist is no disaster. Dissent is good for the souls of all concerned.
o Eric Temple Bell, The Development of Mathematics (1940)

 Descartes' method of finding tangents and normals... was not a happy inspiration. It was quickly
superseded by that of Fermat as amplified by Newton. Fermat's method amounts to obtaining a tangent as the
limiting position of a secant, precisely as is done in the calculus today. ...Fermat's method of tangents is the
basis of the claim that he anticipated Newton in the invention of the differential calculus.
o Eric Temple Bell, The Development of Mathematics (1940)

 Archimedes was the earliest thinker to develop the apparatus of an infinite series with a finite limit
...starting on the conceptual path toward calculus. Of the giants on whose shoulders Isaac Newton would
eventually perch, Archimedes was the first.
o Alex Bellos, The Grapes of Math (2014)

 The fundamental definitions of the calculus, those of the derivative and integral, are now so clearly
stated in textbooks on the subject... that it is easy to forget the difficulty with which these basic concepts have
been developed.
o Carl B. Boyer The History of the Calculus and Its Conceptual Development (1949).

 The precision of statement and the facility of application which the rules of the calculus early afforded
were in a measure responsible for the fact that mathematicians were insensible to the delicate subtleties required
in the logical development... They sought to establish calculus in terms of the conceptions found in traditional
geometry and algebra which had been developed from spatial intuition.
o Carl B. Boyer, The History of the Calculus and Its Conceptual Development (1949).

 Just as the problem of defining instantaneous velocities in terms of the approximation of average
velocities was to lead to the definition of the derivative, so that of defining lengths, areas, and volumes of
curvilinear configurations was to eventuate in the formation of the definite integral. ...This definition then
invokes, apart from the ordinary operations of arithmetic, only the concept of the limit of an infinite sequence of
terms, precisely as does that of the derivative. The realization of this fact, however, followed only after many
centuries of investigation by mathematicians.
o Carl B. Boyer, The History of the Calculus and Its Conceptual Development (1949).

 Fermat had recourse to the principle of the economy of nature. Heron and Olympiodorus had pointed out

in antiquity that, in reflection, light followed the shortest possible path, thus accounting for the equality of
angles. During the medieval period Alhazen and Grossetestehad suggested that in refraction some such
principle was also operating, but they could not discover the law. Fermat, however, not only knew
(through Descartes) the law of refraction, but he also invented a procedure—equivalent to the differential
calculus—for maximizing and minimizing a function of a single variable. ...Fermat applied his method ...and
discovered, to his delight, that the result led to precisely the law which Descartes had enunciated. But although
the law is the same, it will be noted that the hypothesis contradicts that of Descartes. Fermat assumed that the
speed of light in water to be less than that in air; Descartes' explanation implied the opposite.
o Carl B. Boyer, The Rainbow: From Myth to Mathematics (1959)

 The Calculus of Variations owed its origin to the attempt to solve a very interesting and rather narrow
class of problems in Maxima and Minima, in which it is required to find the form of a function such that the
definite integral of an expression involving that function and its derivative shall be a maximum or a minimum.

 William Elwood Byerly, Introduction to the Calculus of Variations (1917) Methods of drawing

tangents were invented by Roberval and Fermat... Descartes gave a third method. Of all the problems which he
 solved by his geometry, none gave him as great pleasure as his mode of constructing tangents. It is profound
but operose, and, on that account, inferior to Fermat's. His solution rests on the method of Indeterminate
Coefficients, of which he bears the honour of invention. Indeterminate coefficients were employed by him also
in solving bi-quadratic equations.
o Florian Cajori, A History of Elementary Mathematics (1898, 1901) Set up and electrotyped
January, 1894; Reprinted March, 1895; October, 1897; November, 1901.

 Every great epoch in the progress of science is preceded by a period of preparation and prevision. The
invention of the differential and integral calculus is said to mark a "crisis" in the history of mathematics. The
conceptions brought into action at that great time had been long in preparation. The fluxional idea occurs among
the schoolmen—among Galileo, Roberval, Napier, Barrow, and others. The differences or differentials
of Leibniz are found in crude form among Cavalieri, Barrow, and others. The undeveloped notion of limits is
contained in the ancient method of exhaustion; limits are found in the writings of Gregory St. Vincent and many
others. The history of the conceptions which led up to the invention of the calculus is so extensive that a good-
sized volume could be written thereon.
o Florian Cajori, Introduction, A History of the Conceptions of Limits and Fluxions in Great
Britain, from Newton to Woodhouse (1919)

 J.M. Child... has made a searching study of Barrow and has arrived at startling conclusions on the
historical question relating to the first invention of the calculus. He places his conclusions in italics in the first
sentence as follows Isaac Barrow was the first inventor of the Infinitesimal Calculus... Before entering upon an
examination of the evidence brought forth by Child it may be of interest to review a similar claim set up for
another man as inventor of the calculus... Fermat was declared to be the first inventor of the calculus
by Lagrange, Laplace, and apparently also by P. Tannery, than whom no more distinguished mathematical
triumvirate can easily be found. ...Dinostratusand Barrow were clever men, but it seems to us that they did not
create what by common agreement of mathematicians has been designated by the term differential and integral
calculus. Two processes yielding equivalent results are not necessarily the same. It appears to us that what can
be said of Barrow is that he worked out a set of geometric theorems suggesting to us constructions by which we
can find lines, areas and volumes whose magnitudes are ordinarily found by the analytical processes of the
calculus. But to say that Barrow invented a differential and integral calculus is to do violence to the habit of
mathematical thought and expression of over two centuries. The invention rightly belongs
to Newton and Leibniz.
o Florian Cajori, "Who was the First Inventor of Calculus" The American Mathematical Monthly
(1919) Vol.26

 It is a curious fact in the history of mathematics that discoveries of the greatest importance were made
simultaneously by different men of genius. The classical example is the... development of the infinitesimal
calculus by Newton and Leibniz. Another case is the development of vector calculus
in Grassmann's Ausdehnungslehre and Hamilton's Calculus of Quaternions. In the same way we find analytic
geometry simultaneously developed by Fermat and Descartes.

 Julian Lowell Coolidge, A History of Geometrical Methods (1940). Reference is to Hermann

Grassmann's Die Lineale Ausdehnungslehre, ein neuer Zweig der Mathematik (The Theory of Linear Extension,
a New Branch of Mathematics). In the method of exhaustion, Archimedes possessed all the elements essential to
an infinitesimal analysis. ...the idea of limit as conceived by Archimedes was adequate for the development of
the calculus of Newton and Leibnitz and... it remained practically unchanged until the days
of Weierstrass and Cantor. ...the principle ...consists in "trapping" the variable magnitude between two others,
as between two jaws of a vise. Thus, in the case of the periphery of a circle... Archimedes grips the
circumference between two sets of regular polygons of an increasing number of sides... one set is
circumscribed... and the other is inscribed. ...By this method he also found the area under a parabolic arch...
o Tobias Dantzig, Number: The Language of Science (1930)
 The statement is so frequently made that the differential calculus deals with continuous magnitude, and
yet an explanation of this continuity is nowhere given; even the most rigorous expositions of the differential
calculus do not base their proofs upon continuity but, with more or less consciousness of the fact, they either
appeal to geometric notions or those suggested by geometry, or depend upon theorems which are never
established in a purely arithmetic manner. ...It then only remained to discover its true origin in the elements of
arithmetic and thus at the same time to secure a real definition of the essence of continuity. I succeeded Nov.
24, 1858.
o Richard Dedekind, Stetigkeit und irrationale Zahlen (1872) translated in Essays on the Theory of
Numbers (1909) by Wooster Woodruff Beman, p. 2.

 If a cone is cut by surfaces parallel to the base, then how are the sections, equal or unequal? If they are
unequal then the cone would have the shape of a staircase; but if they were equal, then all sections will be equal,
and the cone will look like a cylinder, made up of equal circles; but this is entirely nonsensical.
o Democritus (ca. 420 BC) as quoted by Bartel Leendert van der Waerden, Science Awakening
I (1975) p. 138, 4th edition, Tr. Arnold Dresden. Note: 1st edition was published in 1954.

 ...nor have I found occasion to depart from the plan... the rejection of the whole doctrine of series in the
establishment of the fundamental parts both of the Differential and Integral Calculus. The method of Lagrange...
had taken deep root in elementary works; it was the sacrifice of the clear and indubitable principle of limits to a
phantom, the idea that an algebra without limits was purer than one in which that notion was introduced. But,
independently of the idea of limits being absolutely necessary even to the proper conception of a convergent
series, it must have been obvious enough to Lagrange himself, that all application of the science to concrete
magnitude, even in his own system, required the theory of limits.
o Augustus De Morgan, The Differential and Integral Calculus (1836)

 I have throughout introduced the Integral Calculus in connexion with the Differential Calculus. ...Is it
always proper to learn every branch of a direct subject before anything connected with the inverse relation is
considered? If so why are not multiplication and involution in arithmetic made to follow addition and
precede subtraction? The portion of the Integral Calculus, which properly belongs to any given portion of the
Differential Calculus increases its power a hundred-fold...
o Augustus De Morgan, The Differential and Integral Calculus (1836)

 When... we have a series of values of a quantity which continually diminish, and in such a way, that
name any quantity we may, however small, all the values, after a certain value, are severally less than that
quantity, then the symbol by which the values are denoted is said to diminish without limit. And if the series of
values increase in succession, so that name any quantity we may, however great, all after a certain point will be
greater, then the series is said to increase without limit. It is also frequently said, when a quantity diminishes
without limit, that it has nothing, zero or 0, for its limit: and that when it increases without limit it has infinity or
∞ or 1⁄0 for its limit.
o Augustus De Morgan, The Differential and Integral Calculus (1836)

 Kepler imagined a given geometrical figure to be decomposed into infinitesimal figures, whose areas or
volumes he added up in some ad hoc way to obtain the area or volume... Cavalieri proceeded by setting up a
one-to-one correspondence between the indivisible elements of two geometrical figures. If corresponding
indivisibles of the two figures had a certain (constant) ratio, he concluded that the areas of volumes of one of
the figures had the same ratio. Typically, the area or volume of one of the figures was known in advance, so this
gave the other. ...
Kepler thought of a geometrical figure as being composed of indivisibles of the same dimension [as the original
figure]... from some process of successive subdivision... However, Cavalieri generally considered a geometrical
 figure to be composed of an indefinitely large number of indivisibles of lower dimension. ...an area as
consisting of ...line segments, and a volume as consisting of... plane sections... Rigor, he wrote in
the Exercitationes, is the affair of philosophy rather than mathematics.
o C. H. Edwards, Jr., The Historical Development of the Calculus (1979)

 Newton regarded the curve   as the locus of the intersection of two moving lines, one vertical

and the other horizontal. The  and   coordinates of the moving point are then functions of the

time  , specifying the locations of the vertical and horizontal lines... The motion is then the composition

of a horizontal motion with velocity vector having length   and a vertical motion with velocity vector

having length  . ...the velocity vector is the parallelogram sum of these ...It follows that the slope of the

tangent line to the curve is .

o C. H. Edwards, Jr., The Historical Development of the Calculus (1979)

 Shortly after his arrival in Paris in 1672, [ Leibniz ] noticed an interesting fact about the sum of
differences of consecutive terms of a sequence of numbers. Given the sequence