User:Andrewaskew/Books/Understanding Mathematics by looking at its development

Looking at developments in mathematical history

 * Overview
 * Mathematics
 * Applied mathematics
 * Pure mathematics
 * History of mathematics
 * Timeline of mathematics


 * History
 * Geometry. ca. 70,000 BC — South Africa, ochre rocks adorned with scratched geometric patterns.
 * Time. ca. 35,000 BC to 20,000 BC — Africa and France, earliest known prehistoric attempts to quantify time.
 * Prime numbers. c. 20,000 BC — Nile Valley, Ishango Bone: possibly the earliest reference to prime numbers.
 * Egyptian multiplication. c. 20,000 BC — Nile Valley, Ishango Bone: possibly the earliest reference to Egyptian multiplication.
 * Numeral systems. c. 3400 BC — Mesopotamia, the Sumerians invent the first numeral system.
 * Mesopotamian units of measurement. c. 3400 BC — Mesopotamia, the Sumerians invent the first numeral system, and a system of weights and measures.
 * Decimal numeral system. c. 3100 BC — Egypt, earliest known decimal system allows indefinite counting by way of introducing new symbols.
 * Surveying. 2700 BC — Egypt, precision surveying.
 * Egyptian calendar. 2400 BC — Egypt, precise astronomical calendar, used even in the Middle Ages for its mathematical regularity.
 * '$\pi. c. 2000 BC — Mesopotamia, the Babylonians compute the first known approximate value of π at 3.125.
 * Platonic solids. c. 2000 BC — Scotland, Carved Stone Balls exhibit a variety of symmetries including all of the symmetries of Platonic solids.
 * Frusta. 1800 BC — Moscow Mathematical Papyrus, findings volume of a frustum.
 * Squaring the circle. 1650 BC — Rhind Mathematical Papyrus, copy of a lost scroll from around 1850 BC, the scribe Ahmes presents the first attempt at squaring the circle.
 * ∞. c. 8th century BC — the Yajur Veda, one of the four Hindu Vedas, contains the earliest concept of infinity, and states that “if you remove a part from infinity or add a part to infinity, still what remains is infinity.”
 * Quadratic equations. 800 BC — Baudhayana, author of the Baudhayana Sulba Sutra, a Vedic Sanskrit geometric text, contains quadratic equations.
 * Pythagorean triples. c. 600 BC — the other Vedic “Sulba Sutras” (“rule of chords” in Sanskrit) use Pythagorean triples.
 * Magic squares. second half of 1st millennium BC — The Lo Shu Square, the unique normal magic square of order three, was discovered in China.
 * Irrational numbers. 530 BC — Pythagoras' group discovers the irrationality of the square root of two.