Constantin Caratheodory and the axiomatic thermodynamics

The birth, raise, development and fortunes of a fundamental theory in therm odynamics, the axiomatic thermodynamics, a creation of Constantin Caratheod ory, is thoroughly presented together with a summary of Caratheodory's biog aphy. Axiomatic thermodynamics is centered around some interesting properti es of Pfaffian differential equations, which are here introduced and used f or some well-known cases in thermodynamics.