Jakob Bielfeld (1717--1770) and the diffusion of statistical concepts in eighteenth century Europe (Q5962964)

Bielfeld, a baron of Prussia, included so-called political arithmetic (population, mortality tables, annuities, and the like) among the many topics discussed in his expository volumes of \textit{Institutions politiques} and \textit{Les premiers traits de l'érudition universelle}. The author tries to make a case that although ``Bielfeld's chapter on political arithmetics was one of many contemporaneous texts on the subject, with no particular originality'', his works ``may have been an important source of diffusion of statistical concepts''. In particular, the present article proposes (but does not offer any supporting evidence) that Euler's papers on political arithmetic ``were probably sparked by his reading of Bielfeld''.