Related papers: In Square Circle: Geometric Knowledge of the Indus…
In point of fact the Indian tradition in mathematics is long and glorious. It dates back to earliest times, and indeed many of the Indian discoveries from 5000 years ago correspond rather naturally to modern mathematical results.
The Indus Civilization, often denoted by its major city Harappa, spanned almost two millennia from 3200 to 1300 BC. Its tradition reaches back to 7000 BC: a 5000 year long expansion of villages and towns, of trading activity, and of…
Despite the extensive amount of scholarly work done on Indian mathematics in the last 200 years, the conditions under which it originated and evolved is still not clear. Often, one reads the ancient texts with the present concepts and…
This paper provides an overview of the birth and early development of Indian astronomy. Taking account of significant new findings from archaeology and literary analysis, it is shown that early mathematical astronomy arose in India in the…
We discuss the work of a brilliant line of Mathematicians who lived in central Kerala and starting with its founder Madhava (1350 CE) developed what can best be described as Calculus and applied it to a class of trigonometric functions. We…
We discuss the understanding of geometry of the circle in ancient India, in terms of enunciation of various principles, constructions, applications etc. during various phases of history and cultural contexts.
This work explores a possible course of evolution of mathematics in ancient times in India when there was no script, no place-value system, and no zero. Reviewing examples of time-reckoning, large numbers, sacrificial altar-making, and…
Sophisticated computation methods were developed 4000 years ago in Mesopotamia in the context of scribal schools. The basics of the computation can be detected in clay tablets written by young students educated in these scribal schools. At…
The question of the origins of logic as a formal discipline is of special interest to the historian of physics since it represents a turning inward to examine the very nature of reasoning and the relationship between thought and reality. In…
The Indus Valley Civilization (IVC) was one of the first great civilizations in prehistory. This bronze age civilization flourished from the end of the fourth millennium BC. It disintegrated during the second millennium BC; despite much…
Archaeological excavations in the sites of the Indus Valley civilization (2500-1900 BCE) in Pakistan and northwestern India have unearthed a large number of artifacts with inscriptions made up of hundreds of distinct signs. To date there is…
The cyclic model of the universe has an old history in India. It has held the preeminent position regarding the origins of the universe, and it is described in astronomical texts, Puranic encyclopaedias, and philosophical literature. Within…
This paper frames calculus as a global, centuries-long development rather than a subject that began only with Newton and Leibniz. Drawing on ideas from Greek, Indian, Islamic, and later European mathematics, it highlights how concepts like…
Jules Bloch's work on formation of the Marathi language has to be expanded further to provide for a study of evolution and formation of Indian languages in the Indian language union (sprachbund). The paper analyses the stages in the…
We have summarized here the astronomical knowledge of the ancient Hindu astronomers. This knowledge was accumulated from before 1500 B.C. up to around 1200 A.D. In Section \ref{equiv} we have correlated terms used by the Hindu astronomers…
This article focuses on evolvement of the history of mathematics as a science and development of its methodology from the 4th century B.C. to the age of Enlightenment.
How were surfaces evaluated before the invention of the sexagesimal place value notation in Mesopotamia? This chapter examines a group of five tablets containing tables for surfaces of squares and rectangles dated to the Early Dynastic…
Pulli Kolam is an ancient mathematical artform that is still practiced today in south India by over a quarter million people. "Pulli" in the Tamil language means dots. A specific type of pulli kolam is "sikku" kolam where a series of dots…
In this paper, we propose that 'embodied mathematics' should be studied not only by reduction to the present individual bodily experience but in an historical context as well, as far as the origins of mathematics are concerned. Some early…
While reading ancient texts one has to be cognizant of the assumptions made about the past. One has to ask: Are these assumptions valid? Are we projecting the present views into the past? A case in point is the dating of Vedanga Jyotisa.…