The Zeroth Book of Graph Theory

Marking 94 years since its first appearance, this book provides an annotated translation of Sainte-Laguë's seminal monograph Les réseaux (ou graphes), drawing attention to its fundamental principles and ideas.

Sainte-Laguë's 1926 monograph appeared only in French, but in the 1990s H. Gropp published a number of English papers describing several aspects of the book. He expressed his hope that an English translation might sometime be available to the mathematics community.

In the 10 years following the appearance of Les réseaux (ou graphes), the development of graph theory continued, culminating in the publication of the first full book on the theory of finite and infinite graphs in 1936 by Dénes König. This remained the only well-known text until Claude Berge's 1958 book on the theory and applications of graphs. By 1960, graph theory had emerged as a significant mathematical discipline of its own.

This book will be of interest to graph theoristsand mathematical historians.

Martin Charles Golumbic is Professor of Computer Science and Founding Director of the Caesarea Rothschild Institute at the University of Haifa. He is the founding Editor-in-Chief of the journal Annals of Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence. His books include Algorithmic Graph Theory and Perfect Graphs and (as co-author) Tolerance Graphs. His current research is in combinatorial mathematics and its applications.

André Sainte-Laguë (1882-1950) was Professor at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers (CNAM). Les Réseaux ou Graphes was the first of his many books, including From Man to Robot and Avec des Nombres et des Lignes: Récréations Mathématiques. He was organizer of the mathematics rooms at the 1937 Paris Exposition, today at the Grand Palais in Paris. He is also known for the Webster-Sainte-Laguë method of parliamentary seat allocation.