Geometry relevant to the binary quintic

Abstract

The aim in this paper is to indicate one way of interpreting covariants of a binary quintic F geometrically, interpretations having been found recently [7] for its quadratic covariant 2C2, called Γ in [7], and its invariant I4. The symbol dCn will denote a covariant of order n in the binary variables x, y and degree d in the coefficients of F, Id being used in preference to dI0 for invariants. The sum d + n is 4 for both 2C2 and I4, and no other covariant affords as small a sum; so it is natural to have begun by interpreting these two and to use them as auxiliaries in interpreting others.