2.1 Introduction to Determinants
2.1.1 Main De.nitions and Notation
We begin by introducing some terminology and notation which will be used from this point on. All the matrices we deal with in this chapter, unless stated otherwise, will be square matrices. One approach to de.ne determinants is to use a recursive de.nition, that is de.ne the determinant of an nn matrix in terms of determinants of n??1n??1 matrices. In turn, these determinants of n ?? 1 n ?? 1 matrices will be de.ned in terms of determinants of n ?? 2 n ?? 2 matrices. And so on. Of course, we do need an absolute de.nition for 2 2 matrices.