In mathematics, the Prym variety construction (named for Friedrich Prym) is a method in algebraic geometry of making an abelian variety from a morphism of algebraic curves. In its original form, it was applied to an unramified double covering of a Riemann surface, and was used by F. Schottky and H. W. E. Jung in relation with the Schottky problem, as it is now called, of characterising Jacobian varieties among abelian varieties. It is said to have appeared first in the late work of Riemann, and was extensively studied by Wirtinger in 1895, including degenerate cases. φ: C1 → C2 ψ: J1 → J2,