Project SherlockEst. Knowledge

Book

1912

Non-Euclidean Geometry: A Critical and Historical Study of its Development

Roberto Bonola

Traces two thousand years of failed attempts to prove the parallel postulate and shows that the failures were the discovery: the postulate is independent, so consistent geometries exist without it.

Before you start

FreeIntermediatelink checked 17 Sept 2026

Read these first

Not a difficulty warning — a route. These are in the library too.

ElementsEuclid, 300 BCEDerives the whole of classical geometry from five postulates, and in doing so invents the axiomatic method every later mathematics is written in.

If this is the wrong level

Too easy? Go hereGeometrical Researches on the Theory of ParallelsNikolai Lobachevsky, 1840Develops a self-consistent geometry in which Euclid's parallel postulate fails, giving the first worked demonstration that a non-Euclidean geometry is logically possible.

Filed under Geometry in Mathematics.