Let be the Minkowski embedding of a number field applied to a nonzero fractional ideal. Under the metric , its covolume is . For ordinary coordinate Lebesgue measure , its covolume is instead . Here is the field discriminant, and the absolute norm of a fractional ideal is positive and multiplicative. The formula follows by taking the embedding determinant of an integral basis, then using the index of an integral ideal and scaling to handle a fractional ideal.
Let and . Normalize the Minkowski embedding of a number field to the covolume-one Euclidean lattice , using the metric with complex coordinates weighted by . Its theta function is
Writing and using the trace dual of a fractional ideal gives . Its small-parameter asymptotic of a lattice theta sum has leading coefficient one. For the unscaled ideal lattice, the leading coefficient is instead ; one must specify the normalization when quoting this limit.
Number field Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-13
A number field is a finite field extension of the rational numbers. Its degree of a field extension is its dimension as a vector space over . Every element is an algebraic number; the primitive element theorem also says that for some single algebraic number .
For example,
The basis makes arithmetic explicit: use to reduce products. Every nonzero element has its inverse in the same field:
The denominator cannot vanish unless , since is not a rational number. For instance, belongs to the number field, although it is not an algebraic integer.
A degree- number field has exactly distinct field embeddings into the complex numbers fixing , because every finite field extension in characteristic zero is a separable field extension. For these are the two real maps
Both preserve addition and multiplication. Keeping both values, rather than just the positive choice of , is what makes the field norm and the Minkowski embedding of a number field useful.
The idele group is the restricted product
with componentwise multiplication and the restricted product topology on the idele group relative to the unit groups at finite places. We need weak approximation for number fields only at the finitely many specified coordinates, not density in the full restricted-product topology.
Here is a proof including the Archimedean places. At each finite place in , choose sufficiently close to , using the definition of the completion. Choose a nonzero clearing their denominators. Pick powers so that whenever . Put . For each positive rational integer coprime to the rational primes below these places, the Chinese remainder theorem gives with . All of satisfy the same congruences.
Under the Minkowski embedding of a number field, is a full lattice in . A fundamental parallelepiped is bounded, so every real vector is within a fixed distance of this lattice, uniformly over its translates. Choose a target vector whose coordinates at the specified Archimedean places are those of , assigning arbitrary values at the other Archimedean places. There is within that fixed distance of the target. Dividing by makes all specified Archimedean errors tend to zero as through the allowed integers. At finite places is a unit, so the earlier congruence bounds persist. By taking the initial approximations sufficiently close, the ultrametric inequality gives the requested errors there too. Thus some satisfies every required inequality. If there are no finite places, set and omit the congruences.
A normalization is important here. I use the covolume-one theta function of a fractional ideal, for which the requested limit is , and also give the formula for the unnormalized Gaussian theta sum.
Let , let , and choose one field embedding for each Archimedean place. The Minkowski embedding of a number field identifies
with a real inner product space having
Its Euclidean Lebesgue measure is . With this convention, the covolume of a fractional ideal lattice is
where is the field discriminant and is the positive absolute norm of a fractional ideal. Thus the Euclidean lattice has covolume . Define
This Gaussian theta sum converges absolutely whenever every .
The trace dual of a fractional ideal is
Here is the inverse different. Since , we have . There is a subtle distinction between the trace pairing and the positive inner product: the dual lattice of is , where the bar conjugates the complex coordinates and fixes the real ones. Indeed,
Consequently . Coordinatewise complex conjugation preserves the weighted squared lengths in the Gaussian theta sum.
Here are the precise analytic formulas used in the proof. For a Schwartz function on , take the Fourier transform to be
For a full Euclidean lattice of covolume , the Poisson summation formula for a Euclidean lattice is
For , the Gaussian Fourier transform, applied in orthonormal real coordinates, gives
More generally, for a real positive-definite matrix that is symmetric. Each complex coordinate contributes two real coordinates, which explains its exponent .
Apply the Poisson summation formula for a Euclidean lattice to , whose covolume is , and use the preceding description of its dual lattice. The anisotropic theta functional equation is
For comparison, the unnormalized Gaussian theta sum
has the functional equation
and its corresponding limit is rather than . Explicitly, our normalization is .
For the small-parameter asymptotic of a lattice theta sum, means that every coordinate tends to zero. In , the zero lattice vector contributes . Every nonzero vector contributes a term tending to zero. Once every , all these terms are bounded by the summable Gaussian theta sum . The dominated convergence theorem therefore gives . Using the anisotropic theta functional equation,
The condition that every coordinate tends to zero matters; alone would not justify this argument.
First suppose for every complex embedding. The coefficients of the monic polynomial
are rational algebraic integers and hence integers. They are uniformly bounded in , because each is an elementary symmetric sum of numbers of modulus one. Only finitely many such integer polynomials can occur, so only finitely many algebraic integers occur. Two powers coincide; since , this gives . Thus is a root of unity. This is Kronecker theorem on algebraic integers in the unit disk.
The second printed assertion is literally false for . For the intended statement with , use the Minkowski embedding: algebraic integers of form a lattice, so only finitely many have all conjugates of modulus at most . A nonzero algebraic integer with every conjugate of modulus at most one has
so every conjugate has modulus one and the first part applies. Consequently every non-root in that finite box has . Choose no larger than the least of these finitely many maxima, taking if there are no non-roots. Then every nonzero satisfying for all is a root of unity.
Dirichlet unit theorem states that for signature ,
and the logarithmic embedding of number field units maps the free part to a full lattice in the hyperplane where the weighted coordinate sum is zero.
For a real quadratic field, the roots of unity are and the logarithms of positive units form a nonzero discrete subgroup . Its smallest positive element is for a unit . Given any positive unit , choose so that ; minimality forces the quotient to be . Applying signs and inverses shows
Since , the ring of integers of a quadratic field is . A unit satisfies the Pell equation . The element
has norm . To prove it is the smallest unit above one without invoking the continued-fraction algorithm, suppose . Replacing by its inverse or negative if needed makes , and the conjugate relation implies , so . For , the numbers are respectively
Only the last list contains a square, namely , which yields the endpoint itself. Hence no smaller unit exists and
For a nonzero fractional ideal of a number field, its trace-dual lattice is the fractional ideal
The equality follows from the definition of the inverse different and invertibility of fractional ideals. Under the positive metric on the Minkowski embedding of a number field, the Euclidean dual lattice of is : coordinatewise complex conjugation converts the positive inner product into the trace pairing. This assertion does not require that conjugation preserve the number field itself.