Trigonometric tables: explicating their construction principles in China (Q500307)

This article traces chronologically, from the ``first'' trigonometric tables introduced by Jesuit missionaries in China at the beginning of the seventeenth century to the last writings on efficient construction principles in the mid-nineteenth century, the convoluted history and contexts for finding the values of the so-called ``eight [trigonometric] lines''. It is a profound study, including less well known texts, not only of their construction principles, but also of the complex nexus of foreign and Chinese knowledge and mathematical practices, that become entangled in the writings of late imperial Chinese mathematician-astronomers.