Aspects of engineering mathematics, 1800–1816

Abstract

As was made clear in Chapter 2 and elsewhere, the new system of engineering schools was introduced principally to supply engineers for public works and military needs. This chapter and Chapter 16 are the principal places in this book for discussions of French engineering, but its concerns permeate several other sections. We shall see in §19.3.1, as a major feature of French physical science, that about half the savants with whom we are concerned worked largely on problems motivated by engineering, while the other half concentrated on the more theoretical branches of mathematical physics and gave engineering limited attention, or even none at all.