PRELIMINARY TEXT. DO NOT USE. Finsler geometry is a metric generalization of Riemannian geometry and has become a comparatively young branch of differential geometry. Although Finsler geometry has its genesis in Riemann's 1854 "Habilitationsvortrag," its systematic study was not initiated until 1918 by Finsler, and the fundamentals were not completely formulated until the mid-thirties. Later, however, the field underwent a rapid development by mathematicians...