''Cocker's Arithmetick'', also known by its full title "Cocker's Arithmetick: Being a Plain and Familiar Method Suitable to the Meanest Capacity for the Full Understanding of That Incomparable Art, As It Is Now Taught by the Ablest School-Masters in City and Country", is a

grammar school A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented secondary school ...

mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...

textbook written by

Edward Cocker Edward Cocker (163122 August 1676) was an English engraver, who also taught writing and arithmetic. Cocker was the reputed author of the famous ''Arithmetick'', the popularity of which has added a phrase ("according to Cocker") to the list of ...

(1631–1676) and published posthumously by John Hawkins in 1678. ''Arithmetick'' along with companion volume, '' Decimal Arithmetick'' published in 1684, were used to teach mathematics in schools in the United Kingdom for more than 150 years. Some controversy exists over the authorship of the book. Augustus De Morgan claimed the work was written by Hawkins, who merely used Cocker's name to lend the authority of his reputation to the book. Ruth Wallis, in 1997, wrote an article in '' Annals of Science'', claiming De Morgan's analysis was flawed and Cocker was the real author. The popularity of ''Arithmetick'' is unquestioned by its more than 130 editions, and that its place was woven in the fabric of the popular culture of the time is evidenced by its references in the phrase, "according to Cocker", meaning "absolutely correct" or "according to the rules". Such noted figures of history as

Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin ( April 17, 1790) was an American polymath who was active as a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher, and political philosopher. Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the leading inte ...

and

Thomas Simpson Thomas Simpson Fellow of the Royal Society, FRS (20 August 1710 – 14 May 1761) was a British mathematician and inventor known for the :wikt:eponym, eponymous Simpson's rule to approximate definite integrals. The attribution, as often in mathe ...

are documented as having used the book. Over 100 years after its publication,

Samuel Johnson Samuel Johnson (18 September 1709 – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer. The ''Oxford ...

carried a copy of ''Arithmetick'' on his tour of Scotland, and mentions it in his letters: :''In the afternoon tea was made by a very decent girl in a printed linen ; she engaged me so much, that I made her a present of Cocker's Arithmetick.'' Though popular, like most texts of its time, ''Arithmetick'' style is formal, stiff and difficult to follow as illustrated in its explanation of the " rule of three". As well as the rule of three, ''Arithmetick'' contains instructions on

alligation Alligation is an old and practical method of solving arithmetic problems related to mixtures of ingredients. There are two types of alligation: alligation medial, used to find the quantity of a mixture given the quantities of its ingredients, and ...

and the

rule of false position In mathematics, the ''regula falsi'', method of false position, or false position method is a very old method for solving an equation with one unknown; this method, in modified form, is still in use. In simple terms, the method is the trial and e ...

. Following the common practice of textbooks at the time, each rule is illustrated with numerous examples of commercial transactions involving the exchange of wheat, rye and other seeds; calculation of costs for the erection of houses and other structures; and the rotation of gears on a shaft. The text contains the earliest known use of the term ''

lowest terms An irreducible fraction (or fraction in lowest terms, simplest form or reduced fraction) is a fraction in which the numerator and denominator are integers that have no other common divisors than 1 (and −1, when negative numbers are considered). I ...

''.

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