As the light from the window grows significantly darker, two men keep awake, scribbling what seems to be chicken scratch onto clay tablets. Carrying out their work to the second or third order, it is remarkable what has been accomplished with some clay, a crude utensil for scratch writing, and the minds of many mathematicians. While this may have not been exactly how it happened, scenes like this one, along with the preservation of their work, provide insight today into the earliest documentation of not only historical algebra, but of mathematics itself.
The Babylonian empire describes a culture that developed in Mesopotamia, often referred to as the ‘Fertile Crescent’ between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The earliest roots of Sumerian civilization in the area date back to 4500 BCE, however, the topic of this paper will specifically be a new Babylonian Empire that replaced the Sumerians around 2000 BCE, centering their civilization around their capital; Babylon. Although mathematical writing was already prevalent in Egypt, Babylon would develop its own cuneiform script, or inscription based writing, and become the new center of mathematics for the world. Around 300 BCE, under the command of Alexander the Great, Seleucos I Invaded Babylon and established a new Seleucid Empire. The scope of this paper will encompass the mathematics of the Babylonian Empire from circa 5400 to 300 BCE; the rise and the fall of Babylon.
While the extent of their mathematics is at its finest elementary, the Babylonian Empire had a more complex and greater understanding of mathematics than the coexisting Egyptian Empire. They adopted types of cuneiform writing from their predecessors in Mesopotamia, but brought algebra and geometry much further...
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Mastin, Luke. “Sumerian/Babylonian Mathematics.” April 6, 2014. Accessed April 6, 2014. http://www.storyofmathematics.com/sumerian.html.
Murio, K. “Small Canal Problems of Babylonian Mathematics.” Historia Sci. 1, no. 3 (1992): 2.
O'Connor, J J. “An Overview of Babylonian Mathematics.” History Topics: Babylonian Mathematics 1, no. 1 (March 2011): 1-1. Accessed April 6, 2014. http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Indexes/Babylonians.html.
.“Babylonian Numerals.” History Topics: Babylonian Mathematics (March 2011): 1. Accessed April 6, 2014. http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/HistTopics/Babylonian_numerals.html.
. “Pythagoras's Theorem in Babylonian Mathematics.” History Topics: Babylonian Mathematics (2011): 1. Accessed April 6, 2014. http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/HistTopics/Babylonian_Pythagoras.html.
Abstract: This paper gives an insight into the Mathematics used by the American Indians. The history of American Indians and how they incorporated mathematics into their lives is scarce. However from the information retrieved by Archeologists, we have an idea of the type of mathematics that was used by American Indians.
The school system of the Sumerians set the educational standards for Mesopotamia culture and other cultures to follow. Their studies included mathematics, botany and linguistics. Some students tha...
The Babylonians specialized in architecture and astronomy. The Babylonian astronomers believed that the position of the stars and planets reflected the mood of the gods and affected life on earth. Hammarabi wrote his code of laws around this time as well. Hammurabi united most of
Much can be learned about Babylonian society through reading the Code of Hammurabi. At a very basic level, the document itself and the materials used to produce it tell a lot about how advanced the empire was.
The ancient Egyptians and Babylonians discovered abstract Geometry. They developed these ideas that were used to build pyramids and help with reestablishing land boundaries. While, the Babylonians used abstract geometry for measuring, construction buildings, and surveying. Abstract geometry uses postulates, rules, definitions and propositions before and up to the time of the Euclid.
Mesopotamia, which was established in the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers around 4000 B.C. had made its mark on history by leaving behind a countless number of contributions, many of which are still practiced in today’s world, or at least have paved the way to further innovations. Their most important contributions would include the development of money, a system of time keeping, and
Mesopotamia is a rich flat plain created by deposits from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. At the southern end of this plain developed the first recognizable civilization, in the area known as Sumer. In 3000 B.C. Sumer contained a dozen or more city-states, each ruled by its own king and worshiped its own patron deity. The citizens of these city-states were classified into three classes: nobles and priests, commoners, and slaves. In the center of a Sumerian city usually stood a tower culminating in a temple for the patron god of the city. The Sumerians believed that this patron god owned the whole city. The Geography of this city helped a lot with the trade, and led to mathematics as well. The Sumerians developed a precise system of mathematical notation called the sexagesimal, in which the number sixty is the main element. We even use this system in our world today! The Sumerian’ chief contribution to later civilizations was writing, even though their script was pictographic.
It is no mystery that without the Ancient Greeks, math as we know it today would not be the same. It is mind blowing to think that people who had no access to our current technology and resources are the ones who came up with the basic principles of the mathematics that we learn and use today without any preceding information on the topic. One of the best examples of such a person is Archimedes. Not only did he excel as a physicist, inventor, engineer, and astronomer, but he is still known today as one of the greatest mathematicians of all time. His contributions to the field laid out many of the basics for what we learn today and his brilliance shocked many. Long after his time, mathematicians were still stumped as to how he reached the genius conclusions that he did. Nicknamed “The Wise One,” Archimedes is a person who can never be forgotten.
"The Foundations of Geometry: From Thales to Euclid." Science and Its Times. Ed. Neil Schlager and Josh Lauer. Vol. 1. Detroit: Gale, 2001. Gale Power Search. Web. 20 Dec. 2013.
The ancient Egyptians and ancient Greeks knew about the golden ratio, regarded as a number that can be found when a line or shape is divided into two parts so that the longer part divided by the smaller part is also equal to the whole length or shape divided by the longer part. The Ancient Greeks and Romans incorporated it and other mathematical relationships, such as the triangle with a 3:4:5 ratio, into the design of monuments including the Great Pyramid, the Colosseum, and the Parthenon. Artists who have been inspired by mathematics and studied mathematics include the Greek sculptor Polykleitos, who created a series of mathematical proportions for carving the ‘perfect’ nude male figurine. Renaissance painters such as Piero della Francesca an...
The concept of impossible constructions in mathematics draws in a unique interest by Mathematicians wanting to find answers that none have found before them. For the Greeks, some impossible constructions weren’t actually proven at the time to be impossible, but merely so far unachieved. For them, there was excitement in the idea that they might be the first one to do so, excitement that lay in discovery. There are a few impossible constructions in Greek mathematics that will be examined in this chapter. They all share the same criteria for constructability: that they are to be made using solely a compass and straightedge, and were referred to as the three “classical problems of antiquity”. The requirements of using only a compass and straightedge were believed to have originated from Plato himself. 1
The history of mathematics has its roots on the African continent. The oldest mathematical object was found in Swaziland Africa. The oldest example of arithmetic was found in Zaire. The 4000 year old, Moscow papyrus, contains geometry, from the Middle Kingdom of Egypt, Egypt was the cradle of mathematics. The great Greek mathematicians, including Pythagoras, Thales, and Exodus all acquired much of their mathematics from Egypt, including the notion of zero. This paper will discuss a brief history of mathematics in Africa. Starting with the Lebombo bone and the Ishango Bone, I will then present Egyptian mathematics and end with a discourse on Muslim mathematics in African. “Most histories of mathematics devote only a few pages to Africa and Ancient Egypt... Generally they ignore the history of mathematics in Africa … and give the impression that this history either did not exist or, at least …is not knowable.”
Burton, D. (2011). The History of Mathematics: An Introduction. (Seventh Ed.) New York, NY. McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
The history of math has become an important study, from ancient to modern times it has been fundamental to advances in science, engineering, and philosophy. Mathematics started with counting. In Babylonia mathematics developed from 2000B.C. A place value notation system had evolved over a lengthy time with a number base of 60. Number problems were studied from at least 1700B.C. Systems of linear equations were studied in the context of solving number problems.
Ancient Mesopotamia was one of the first of the ancient civilizations. It formed in present-day northeastern Egypt, in the Fertile Crescent. The Fertile Crescent is a crescent-shaped region of good farmland created by the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. The first people to settle in Mesopotamia made important contributions to the world, such as wheeled vehicles, and an early form of writing called Cuneiform. Later, the Phoenicians here developed an alphabet much like the one we use today. Also, the Sumerians of this region developed algebra and geometry. Most importantly, the Sumerians made extensive irrigation systems, dikes, and canals to protect their crops from floods. The Great Hammurabi of Babylon, another empire in the Fertile Crescent, made the Code of Hammurabi. It was the first significant set of laws in history. Also, the Hittites and the Lydians settled in Mesopotamia. The Hittites developed a way to produce strong plows and weapons. The Lydians created a system of coined money. The contributions from the region of Mesopotamia in ancient times are still used today and are very useful.