Affine Subspace

Pub May 11, 2026 Up Jun 20, 2026

Definition 1. Let $V$ be a vector space and $X \subseteq V$. $X$ is an affine subspace if there is $v \in V$ and a subspace $W \subseteq V$ such that $X = v + W$.

Proposition 1. Every subspace of a vector space is an affine subspace.

Proposition 2. Let $V$ be a vector space. For any affine subspace $X = v + W$ ($v \in V$, $W \subseteq V$):

  1. For any $x \in V$,

    \[x \in X \enspace\lrimp\enspace x - v \in W.\]
  2. For any $x \in X$,

    \[X = x + W.\]

Proposition 3. The underlying subspace of every affine subspace is unique. That means, if $V$ is a vector space, $v$, $v’ \in V$ and $W$, $W’ \subseteq V$ are subspaces such that

\[v + W = v' + W',\]

then $W = W’$.