This book was written over a period of more than six years. Several months after we finished our work, N. I. Fel'dman (the senior author of the book)
died. All additions and corrections entered after his death were made by his coauthor. The assistance of many of our colleagues was invaluable during the writing of the book. They examined parts of the manuscript and suggested many improvements, made useful comments and corrected many errors. I much have pleasure in acknowledging our great indebtedness to them. Special thanks are due to A. B. Shidlovskii, V. G. Chirskii, A. I. Galochkin and O. N. Vasilenko. I would like to express my gratitude to D. Bertrand and J. Wolfart for their help in the final stages of this book. Finally, I wish to thank Neal Koblitz for having translated this text into English.