J. geom.

75 (2002) 106 – 112

0047–2468/02/020106 – 07
© Birkhäuser Verlag, Basel, 2002
DOI 10.1007/s00022-002-1490-0

The Gergonne and Nagel centers of a tetrahedron

Mowaffaq Hajja and Peter Walker

Abstract. The Gergonne center of a triangle is the intersection of the cevians through the points where the incircle
touches the sides. This does not admit a direct generalization to tetrahedra since the cevians of a tetrahedron
through the points where the insphere touches the faces are not necessarily concurrent. This article introduces an
alternative definition of the Gergonne center that coincides with the previous definition for the triangle and that
admits a generalization to tetrahedra. The same is done for the Nagel center.

Mathematics Subject Classification (2000): 51.

Key words: Gergonne center, Nagel center.

1. Introduction

The Gergonne center [4] of a triangle ABC is defined to be the point of intersection of the
cevians AA
, BB
, CC
where A
, B
, C
are the points where the incircle of ABC touches
the sides BC, CA, AB (Figure 1). Such cevians are concurrent by Ceva’s Theorem since
A
, B
, C
can be equivalently defined by the algebraic relations

AB
= AC
, BC
= BA
, CA
= CB
(1)

The Nagel center is defined similarly by taking A
, B
, C
to be the points where the excircles
touch the sides (Figure 1). It can be easily seen that the points A
, B
, C
can also be defined
by the relations

BC
= CB
, CA
= AC
, AB
= BA
(2)

This note is a result of the question whether Gergonne and Nagel centers can be defined for
a general tetrahedron in a similar way.
Before answering this question (in Theorems 1 and 2), we remark that while the incenter,
circumcenter, the centroid and the Fermat-Torricelli center of a general tetrahedron can be
defined in exactly the same way as they are defined for a triangle, the same cannot be said of
the orthocenter. In fact, tetrahedra with an orthocenter (i.e. with concurrent altitudes) are

106
Vol. 75, 2002 The Gergonne and Nagel centers of a tetrahedron 107

A
C′
B′
C′ B′

B A′ C

B C
A′

Figure 1

characterized by the rather restrictive property that their nonadjacent edges are orthogonal
[1, Theorem 212, p. 71 and Exercise 3, p. 73]. This should remove the impression, if any,
that all results concerning the centers of a triangle have analogues for a tetrahedron.

2. The Gergonne center

It is most natural to define the Gergonne center of a tetrahedron ABCD to be the point
of intersection (if any) of the cevians AA
, BB
, CC
, DD
where A
, B
, C
, D
are the
points where the insphere touches the faces. As seen in [3] and [2], for example, such
cevians are concurrent only for a limited class of tetrahedra. Thus we turn our attention to
the possibility of an alternative characterization of A
, B
, C
, D
parallel to the one given
by (1).

To this end, we note that (1) defines the points A
, B
, C
in terms of the six segments
into which these points divide the sides. The defining property is the requirement that
any two segments that share a vertex are equal. For a tetrahedron ABCD, one may then
consider defining A
, B
, C
, D
in terms of the 12 triangles into which they divide the
faces. In analogy with the case of a triangle, one may suggest as the defining property the
requirement that any two of the 12 resulting triangles that share a same edge have equal
areas. This condition is shown in Figure 2 where our tetrahedron is opened flat and where
equal areas are designated by the same letter. Under this condition and the requirement that
the cevians AA
, BB
, CC
, DD
are concurrent, we will see that the points A
, B
, C
, D

exist and are unique. The point of intersection of AA
, BB
, CC
, DD
will be called the
Gergonne center.
The generalized Ceva’s Theorem [6] states that the cevians AA
, BB
, CC
, DD
are
concurrent if and only if one can assign masses MA , MB , MC , MD to the vertices in such a
108 Mowaffaq Hajja and Peter Walker J. Geom.

D
C D
X X

Y y Z
z
z y

x
A
x B

Y Z

Figure 2

way that the center of mass of each three of them is one of the points A
, B
, C
, D
. From
Figure 2, this is equivalent to the conditions

MA : MB : MC = x : y : z , MB : MC : MD = Z : Y : x ,
MC : MD : MA = X : y : Z , MD : MA : MB = z : Y : X.

These in turn can be seen to be equivalent to the conditions

Xx = Yy = Zz (= t, say) (3)

Denoting the areas of the faces by α, β, γ , δ, we see that

x + y + z = δ (4)
x + Y + Z = α (5)
X + y + Z = β (6)
X + Y + z = γ (7)

Adding (5), (6) and (7) and subtracting (4), we get

X + Y + Z = (α + β + γ − δ)/2 (8)

Subtracting (8) from (5) and using the fact that X = t/x, we obtain

x − t/x + (−α + β + γ − δ)/2 = 0

and hence

x 2 + x(−α + β + γ − δ)/2 − t = 0.
Vol. 75, 2002 The Gergonne and Nagel centers of a tetrahedron 109

Doing the same for y and z and setting

a = (−α + β + γ − δ)/2 , b = (α − β + γ − δ)/2 ,

c = (α + β − γ − δ)/2 (9)

we see that

x 2 + ax − t = 0, y 2 + by − t = 0, z2 + cz − t = 0 (10)

Assuming that x, y, z are > 0, it follows that

2x = −a + a 2 + 4t , 2y = −b + b2 + 4t , 2z = −c + c2 + 4t (11)

Adding these equations and using (4), it follows that

2δ = − (a + b + c) + ( a 2 + 4t + b2 + 4t + c2 + 4t) (12)

From (9) it follows that

2δ + (a + b + c) = (α + β + γ + δ)/2 (13)

This with (12) imply that

a 2 + 4t + b2 + 4t + c2 + 4t = (α + β + γ + δ)/2 (14)
√ √ √
As a function of t ∈ [0, ∞), a 2 + 4t + b2 + 4t + c2 + 4t is increasing and its range
is [| a | + | b | + | c |, ∞). In view of (9), the existence of a (unique) t > 0 that satisfies
(14) is therefore equivalent to the condition that
     
α+β +γ +δ  −α + β + γ − δ   α − β + γ − δ   α + β − γ − δ 
≥       
2 2 + 2 + 2 

To prove that this is satisfied for all tetrahedra, we consider the expression
α+β +γ +δ −α + β + γ − δ α−β +γ −δ α+β −γ −δ
+ 1 + 2 + 3
2 2 2 2
and we let 1 , 2 , 3 assume the values ±1. The eight quantities

α, β, γ , δ, α + β + γ − δ, β + γ + δ − α, γ + δ + α − β, δ + α + β − γ

that we obtain are positive since the sum of the areas of any 3 faces of a tetrahedron is
greater than the area of the fourth [5, Theorem 2].
Thus for every tetrahedron, there exists a unique value t0 > 0 of t that satisfies (14). Using
(11) and then (3) we obtain the corresponding solutions for x, y, z, X, Y, Z. Conversely, it
is not difficult to see that the solutions for x, y, z, X, Y, Z thus obtained do indeed satisfy
(4), (5), (6) and (7). We summarize this in the following theorem:
110 Mowaffaq Hajja and Peter Walker J. Geom.

THEOREM 1. Let ABCD be any tetrahedron. Then there exists a unique M in the interior
of ABCD such that the 12 triangles into which the cevians through M divide the faces have
the property that any two that share an edge have equal areas. This M is called the Gergonne
center of ABCD.

3. The Nagel center

Here again, instead of defining the Nagel center of the tetrahedron ABCD to be the inter-
section of the cevians AA
, BB
, CC
, DD
where A
, B
, C
, D
are the points where the
exspheres touch the faces, we define A
, B
, C
, D
in terms of the 12 triangles into which
they divide the faces. In the case of a triangle, note that (2) defines A
, B
, C
in terms of the
six segments into which the points A
, B
, C
divide the sides by the requirement that any
two segments that lie on two different sides and that share an endpoint each with the third
side are equal. For a tetrahedron ABCD, one may then consider the requirement that any
three of the 12 resulting triangles that lie on three different faces and that share an edge each
with the fourth face have equal areas. This is expressed in Figure 3 by designating equal
areas by the same letter. Note here that the concurrency of AA
, BB
, CC
, DD
is already
guaranteed (by simply taking (MA , MB , MC , MD ) = (x, y, z, t)). Letting α, β, γ , δ denote
the areas of the faces as before, we get the following equations:

x + y + z = δ (15)
t + y + z = α (16)
x + t + z = β (17)
x + y + t = γ (18)

These lead immediately to the solution

t = (−2α + β + γ + δ)/3 , x = (α − 2β + γ + δ)/3

y = (α + β − 2γ + δ)/3 , z = (α + β + γ − 2δ)/3.

This shows that an interior Nagel center (as defined here) exists only if the sum of the
areas of any three faces of the tetrahedron is greater than twice the area of the fourth. We
summarize this in the following theorem:

THEOREM 2. For a tetrahedron ABCD, the following two conditions are equivalent:

(i) There exists a unique M in the interior of ABCD such that the 12 triangles into
which the cevians through M divide the faces have the property that any three that
lie on different faces and that share an edge each with the fourth face have equal
areas.
Vol. 75, 2002 The Gergonne and Nagel centers of a tetrahedron 111

D
C D
y z

x t x
t z y

x
A
t B

z y

Figure 3

(ii) The sum of the areas of any three faces of the tetrahedron is greater than twice the
area of the fourth.

When this point M exists, we call it the Nagel center of ABCD.

REMARKS. The referee kindly drew our attention to related work done by the late
Victor Thébault. In [7], Thébault defines the Nagel center of a tetrahedron by require-
ments equivalent to (15)–(18) above. Thus that definition of the Nagel center coincides
with ours. In [8], the Gergonne center of a tetrahedron A1 A2 A3 A4 is defined to be the point
whose barycentric coordinates are

tan α1 : tan α2 : tan α3 : tan α4

where αj is the angle that the bisector of the trihedral angle at Aj makes with each of the
faces that contain Aj . Beside being the algebraic analogue of one of the characterizations
of the Gergonne center of a triangle, this definition is motivated by geometric consider-
ations detailed there. It would be interesting to characterize those tetrahedra for which
Thébault’s definition of the Gergonne center coincides with ours. Finally, we remark that
generalizations to higher dimensions are left for future projects.

Acknowledgement.

We are grateful to the referee for his valuable comments and for drawing our attention
to References [7] and [8] and to Professor Roland Eddy for drawing our attention to
Reference [2]. We would also like to thank Ayman Hajja for drawing the figures.
112 Mowaffaq Hajja and Peter Walker J. Geom.

References
[1] Altshiller-Court, N., Modern Pure Solid Geometry, Second Edition, Chelsea, NY 1964.
[2] Fritsch, R., Tetraeder und Kugeln, Shaker Verlag, Aachen 2000.
[3] Hajja, M. and Walker, P., The inspherical Gergonne center of a tetrahedron, preprint.
[4] Kimberling, C., Central points and central lines in the plane of the triangle, Math. Mag. 67 (1994), 163–187.
[5] Klamkin, M. S., Vector proofs in solid geometry, Amer. Math. Monthly 78 (1970), 1051–1065.
[6] Landy, S., A generalization of Ceva’s theorem to higher dimensions, Amer. Math. Monthly 95 (1988),
936–938.
[7] Thébault, V., Nagel point in the tetrahedron, Amer. Math. Monthly 54 (1947), 275–276.
[8] Thébault, V., Sur des points de Gergonne et de Nagel d’un tétraèdre, Math. Gaz. 33 (1949), 270–272.

Mowaffaq Hajja Peter Walker

Mathematics American University of Sharjah
Yarmouk University P. O. Box 26666–Sharjah
Irbid-Jordan United Arab Emirates
e-mail: mhajja@yu.edu.jo e-mail: peterw@aus.ac.ae

Received 4 February 2000; revised 1 May 2000.