Dedekind Domains, Finitely Many Prime Ideals

One Prime Ideal

Let R be a dedekind domain with one prime ideal P.  All ideals are powers of P, and are linearly ordered by containment.  This makes R a valuation ring.  The valuation group is isomorphic to the integers, as dictated by the powers of P.  This makes R a dvr, and a pid.

Finitely Many Primes

Let R be a dedekind domain with finitely many prime ideals.  Since prime ideals do not contain each other, ideals are not linearly ordered, and R is not a valuation ring, or a dvr.  However, R is still a pid.

By criteria 2, it is enough to show each prime ideal is principal.

Let H be the sum of any two prime ideals.  If this does not span 1 then drive H up to a maximal ideal M, which contains our two prime ideals.  Now M contains two different maximal ideals, hence one of them is not maximal after all.  This is a contradiction.  The prime ideals are pairwise coprime, and if J is the product of these prime ideals, the chinese remainder theorem tells us R is isomorphic to the direct product of fields R/Pi for each prime ideal Pi.

In a generalization of the above, let H be the sum of two prime powers.  If this does not span 1 then a maximal ideal M contains both prime powers, and since M is prime, it contains both prime ideals.  Once again M contains two maximal ideals, a contradiction.  If J is the product of prime powers, R/J is isomorphic to the direct product of the quotient rings R mod these prime powers.

Let P be one of the aforementioned prime ideals and let c lie in P-P2.  Apply the chinese remainder theorem to P2, and all other prime ideals.  Let g = c mod P2, and 1 mod all other primes.  If g lies in some other prime Q then g becomes 0 in the field R/Q, which is a contradiction.  Thus g, and the ideal generated by g, does not lie in Q or any power of Q.  If Q is part of the unique factorization of g*R, then g would lie in Q.  Thus g generates a power of P.

If g were a unit it would be invertible mod P, yet it is 0 mod P.  Thus g*R is a positive power of P, at least P1.  If g*R is P2 or higher than g becomes 0 mod P2.  Yet g = c mod P2, which is nonzero.  Therefore g*R = P, and P is primciple.  This holds for every prime ideal P, and R is a pid.