Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 May 2013
Let $G$ be a connected, reductive algebraic group over a number field $F$ and let $E$ be an algebraic representation of ${G}_{\infty } $. In this paper we describe the Eisenstein cohomology ${ H}_{\mathrm{Eis} }^{q} (G, E)$ of $G$ below a certain degree ${q}_{ \mathsf{res} } $ in terms of Franke’s filtration of the space of automorphic forms. This entails a description of the map ${H}^{q} ({\mathfrak{m}}_{G} , K, \Pi \otimes E)\rightarrow { H}_{\mathrm{Eis} }^{q} (G, E)$, $q\lt {q}_{ \mathsf{res} } $, for all automorphic representations $\Pi $ of $G( \mathbb{A} )$ appearing in the residual spectrum. Moreover, we show that below an easily computable degree ${q}_{ \mathsf{max} } $, the space of Eisenstein cohomology ${ H}_{\mathrm{Eis} }^{q} (G, E)$ is isomorphic to the cohomology of the space of square-integrable, residual automorphic forms. We discuss some more consequences of our result and apply it, in order to derive a result on the residual Eisenstein cohomology of inner forms of ${\mathrm{GL} }_{n} $ and the split classical groups of type ${B}_{n} $, ${C}_{n} $, ${D}_{n} $.