Let α be a limit ordinal with the property that any “recursive” function whose domain is a proper initial segment of α has its range bounded by α. α is then called admissible (in a sense to be made precise later) and a recursion theory can be developed on it (α-recursion theory) by providing the generalized notions of α-recursively enumerable, α-recursive and α-finite. Takeuti [12] was the first to study recursive functions of ordinals, the subject owing its further development to Kripke [7], Platek [8], Kreisel [6], and Sacks [9].

Infinitary logic on the other hand (i.e., the study of languages which allow expressions of infinite length) was quite extensively studied by Scott [11], Tarski, Kreisel, Karp [5] and others. Kreisel suggested in the late '50's that these languages (even which allows countable expressions but only finite quantification) were too large and that one should only allow expressions which are, in some generalized sense, finite. This made the application of generalized recursion theory to the logic of infinitary languages appear natural. In 1967 Barwise [1] was the first to present a complete formalization of the restriction of to an admissible fragment (A a countable admissible set) and to prove that completeness and compactness hold for it. [2] is an excellent reference for a detailed exposition of admissible languages.