Basis in earlier work
Scholars believe that the Elements is largely a compilation of propositions based on books by earlier Greek mathematicians.
Proclus (412–485

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The Elements is still considered a masterpiece in the application of logic to mathematics. In historical context, it has proven enormously

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• Book 1 contains 5 postulates (including the famous parallel postulate) and 5 common notions, and covers important topics of plane geometry such as the Pythagorean theorem, equality of angles and areas, parallelism, the sum of the angles in a triangle, and

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Euclid's list of axioms in the Elements was not exhaustive, but represented the principles that were the most important. His proofs often invoke axiomatic notions which were not originally presented in his list of axioms. Later editors have interpolated Euclid's

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It was not uncommon in ancient times to attribute to celebrated authors works that were not written by them. It is by these means that the

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• 1460s, Regiomontanus (incomplete)
• 1482, Erhard Ratdolt (Venice), first printed edition
• 1533, editio princeps by Simon Grynäus

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Euclid's axiomatic approach and constructive methods were widely influential.
Many of Euclid's propositions were constructive,

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