Earliest Known Uses of Some of the Words of Mathematics

Check out this amazing compendium on the Earliest Known Uses of Some of the Words of Mathematics.

An interesting extract from this page that clarifies an important ambiguity about the word function -- as to whether it's mathematical usage preceded it's common vernacular usage with regard to utility and design:

"The word FUNCTION first appears in a Latin manuscript "Methodus tangentium inversa, seu de fuctionibus" written by Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) in 1673. Leibniz used the word in the non-analytical sense, as a magnitude which performs a special duty. He considered a function in terms of "mathematical job"--the "employee" being just a curve. He apparently conceived of a line doing "something" in a given figura ["aliis linearum in figura data functiones facientium generibus assumtis"]. From the beginning of his manuscript, however, Leibniz demonstrated that he already possessed the idea of function, a term he denominates relatio.

A paper "De linea ex lineis numero infinitis ordinatim..." in the Acta Eruditorum of April 1692, pp. 169-170, signed "O. V. E." but probably written by Leibniz, uses functiones in a sense to denote the various 'offices' which a straight line may fulfil in relation to a curve, viz. its tangent, normal, etc..."

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