Victor J. Katz and Karen Hunger Parshall
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691149059
- eISBN:
- 9781400850525
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691149059.003.0002
- Subject:
- Mathematics, History of Mathematics
This chapter explores the beginnings of algebra in Egypt and Mesopotamia. They are the earliest civilizations to have left written mathematical records, and they date back thousands of years. From ...
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This chapter explores the beginnings of algebra in Egypt and Mesopotamia. They are the earliest civilizations to have left written mathematical records, and they date back thousands of years. From both, we have original documents detailing mathematical calculations and mathematical problems, mostly designed to further the administration of the countries. Both also fostered scribes of a mathematical bent who carried out mathematical ideas well beyond the immediate necessity of solving a given problem. If mathematics was thus similarly institutionalized in Egypt and Mesopotamia, it nevertheless took on dramatically different forms, being written in entirely distinct ways in the two different regions. This key difference aside, the beginnings of algebra are evident in the solutions of problems that have come down to us from scribes active in both of these ancient civilizations.Less
This chapter explores the beginnings of algebra in Egypt and Mesopotamia. They are the earliest civilizations to have left written mathematical records, and they date back thousands of years. From both, we have original documents detailing mathematical calculations and mathematical problems, mostly designed to further the administration of the countries. Both also fostered scribes of a mathematical bent who carried out mathematical ideas well beyond the immediate necessity of solving a given problem. If mathematics was thus similarly institutionalized in Egypt and Mesopotamia, it nevertheless took on dramatically different forms, being written in entirely distinct ways in the two different regions. This key difference aside, the beginnings of algebra are evident in the solutions of problems that have come down to us from scribes active in both of these ancient civilizations.
