# Where can I find the old papers of the Math Tripos?

Is there a repository on the Internet which has the old question papers of the tripos? I am specifically interested in the papers during the 1890-1910 era, which was the era before the reforms, although I'm also interested in the other, more recent papers.

Most of the problems which I have come across from the pre-reform era are very interesting, and it would be wonderful if the actual full papers are accessible now.

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It looks to me that the Internet Archive has some, e.g. this. – J. M. Sep 10 '11 at 5:15
May I ask why there are sentences like "Shew that ... " instead of "Show that ..." ? – Michel Marcus Oct 26 '11 at 7:48
Old English. – J. M. Oct 26 '11 at 7:54
This doesn't really answer your question, since you asked for online copies; but when I was an undergraduate I occasionally used to play snooker in the Cambridge Union's snooker room, which had an entire wall covered in shelves containing volumes of 19th-century Maths Tripos papers. So if you have a contact who is physically in Cambridge, that would be a place to look. – David Loeffler Oct 26 '11 at 8:57
If you are still interested, I can upload one from $1842$ – Julien Godawatta Jan 6 '14 at 0:55

There are dozens of books which contain papers and solutions. The exam used to be called the senate-house examination a while ago, hence the titles. 'Tripos' is derived from the way the exam was taken, where you had to sit on a 3-legged wooden stool and "wrangle" - argue through problems orally - with the examiners. ('Riders' are just the first few parts of a problem, which are usually simple book-work questions in order to allow the weaker candidates to gain some points on the exam.) To name a few:

1. Cambridge senate-house problems and riders, with solutions, 1875 - Greenhill
2. Cambridge senate-house problems and riders, with solutions, 1878 - Glaisher
3. Mathematical problems for Cambridge Mathematical Tripos - Wolstenholme (I remember seeing a solutions manual to this somewhere, but it might be called something weird like "Key to..." instead of "Solutions to...".)
4. Cambridge senate-house problems and riders, 1848-1851 - Ferrers
5. Cambridge senate-house problems and riders, 1843-1851 - Jameson
6. Cambridge senate-house problems and riders, 1854 - Walton
7. Cambridge senate-house problems and riders, 1857 - Walton

You can easily discover more by searching "cambridge senate house" on archive.org. Other useful terms include: "cambridge problems and riders", "cambridge senate house solutions", "problems cambridge examinations", "cambridge examples", etc.

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An example search though they are mostly earlier than 1890 – Henry Aug 15 '15 at 9:25

They seem to be hard to find! Here is a link to one from 1906 which was published in the Bulletin of the AMS. The article begins with a lengthy description, but includes the actual exam papers. (Navigate to the bottom of the page to find a link to the .pdf.)

An interesting book available from Google e-books for the right price (free) can be found here. It overlaps with your specified period, and has exam papers in various subjects, including mathematics.

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I think if you search through archive.org you will find some there

EDIT: These are outside your era however..

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