[HM] witch of Agnesi

John L. Bell (jbell@julian.uwo.ca)
Fri, 30 Apr 1999 08:09:23 -0400

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The "witch of Agnesi": I'd be grateful if someone could enlighten me on why
the the term "witch" was assigned to this well-known cubic curve. In
Italian it is called "Versiera", which according to my Italian dictionary
translates as "hobgoblin", but the curve's shape suggests nothing
supernatural to me.

John Bell

*****************
Professor John L. Bell
Department of Philosophy
University of Western Ontario
London, Ontario
Canada N6A 3K7

Web page: http://publish.uwo.ca/~jbell/

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