The History of Mathematics: A Brief Course

3. MODERN EUROPEAN WOMEN 91

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First page of an undated letter from Kovalevskaya. Probably the

letter was written in June 1886 and meant for Charles Hermite.

The reason it was not sent is probably that she saw Hermite in

person before posting it. The letter communicates her discovery of

a completely integrable case of the equations of motion of a rigid

body about a fixed point under the influence of gravity. Courtesy

of the Institut Mittag-Leffler.