The First Six Books of The Elements of Euclid

Facsimile of the famous first edition of 1847.

Euclid in Living Color: Oliver Byrne’s illustrated edition of Elements! Nearly a century before Mondrian made geometrical red yellow and blue lines famous 19th-century mathematician Oliver Byrne employed the color scheme for his 1847 edition of Euclid’s mathematical and geometric treatise Elements. Byrne’s idea was to use color to make learning easier and “diffuse permanent knowledge.” The result has been described as one of the oddest and most beautiful books of the 19th century. The facsimile of Byrne’s vivid publication is now available in a beautiful new edition. A masterwork of art and science it is as beautiful in the boldness of its red yellow and blue figures and diagrams as it is in the mathematical precision of its theories. In the simplicity of forms and colors the pages anticipate the vigor of De Stijl and Bauhaus design. In making complex information at once accessible and aesthetically engaging this work is a forerunner to the information graphics that today define much of our data consumption.

Includes a second volume with an introductory essay by Swiss art historian Werner Oechslin.