The life insurance equation. First edition of the text that founded life insurance as a mathematical field, variant title listing only William Pearson as the publisher (ESTC N30304).

Abraham de Moivre (1667-1754), a founder of the fields of probability theory and analytic geometry, was a French Huguenot who moved to London following the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. He became a mathematics tutor, joined the intellectual circle around Edmund Halley and Isaac Newton, and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society based on his work expanding Newton's method of fluxions and binomial theorem. His 1718 book The Doctrine of Chances, on gambling, was only the second work on probability ever published.

In Annuities upon Lives de Moivre 'formulated the hypothesis that among a body of persons over a certain age the successive annual decreases by death are nearly equal' (Morton, A Medical Bibliography 1690). 'This mathematics became a standard part of all subsequent commercial applications in England' (Dictionary of Scientific Biography).

First edition; 4to (22 x 13 cm); errata on A8 verso, woodcut head and tail-pieces and initials, table, contemporary ownership signature to title, 2 19th-century ownership inscriptions to front blank, upper corner of front blank torn with loss, small portion of the upper corner of the title trimmed off, small chip from the lower edge of the table, a little spotting to title, text toned at the extreme edges; recently rebound to style in brown half calf, spine gilt in compartments with floral tools, marbled sides, new endpapers, a very good copy; 108pp.

ESTC N30304; Norman Library of Science & Medicine 1530; Morton, A Medical Bibliography 1690.