A Combinatorial Proof for Cayley's Identity

Abstract

In a recent paper, Caracciolo, Sokal and Sportiello presented, inter alia, an algebraic/combinatorial proof for Cayley's identity. The purpose of the present paper is to give a "purely combinatorial" proof for this identity; i.e., a proof involving only combinatorial arguments. Since these arguments eventually employ a generalization of Laplace’s Theorem, we present a "purely combinatorial" proof for this theorem, too.