Cocker's Arithmetick
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 mathematics textbook written by Edward Cocker (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".