PYTHAGORAS

THEOREM

WHO IS PYTHAGORAS?
Pythagoras was a Greek philosopher and
mathematician. He was born around 570 BCE
in Samos, Greece and died at around 500-490
BCE in Metapontum, Italy. Not much is known
about Pythagoras, but the first accounts of his
life are mentioned roughly 150 years after his
death. It is said that Pythagoras went to Egypt The Pyth
and Babylon as a young man and emigrated
to Italy around 523 BCE to escape the theore
tyrannical rule of Samo’s. There he
established his etheco-political academy in
mathemat
croton. that app
WHEN WAS THE triangles.
THEOREM INVENTED? that the
While the Pythagoras Theorem is long squares of t
associated with Pythagoras, its origins date
back far longer. The Pythagorean theorem of the two s
was first mentioned in the ancient Babylonian
and Ancient Egyptian tablets which predate (a and b) is
1900 B.C. These tablets included precise
calculations of the square root of 2, (the
the squar
length of the hypotenuse if both legs are
equal to 1) and lists of special integers also
length
known as Pythagorean Triads. There are also
many other accounts of Pythagoras Theorem
hypotenus
occurring, including in India. formula it i
a^2+b^
 INFLUENCE
Pythagoras' Theorem is an essential
component in modern construction and
architecture in a building involving triangles,
as the theorem deals with lengths that may
not be able to be calculated beforehand.
These can include slopes on buildings, roofs,

PROOF
hagorean
em is a
tical law
plies to
. It states Both squares demonsrate how a^2+b^2
e sum of gives you c^2, as they are shifted and
moved into squares. Both squares have a
the lengths side of (a+b) and the side being calculated
is c^2.
short sides
s equal to INTERESTING EVENTS
re of the After Pythagoras settled in Croton, he
established a school of mathematics, where
of the all members were forced to take strict
se (c). As a vows of secrecy. All new mathematical
findings were to be attributed to his name.
is known as Therefore, not only is the first proof of the
theorem unknown, but there is doubt that
^2=c^2. Pythagoras actually proved the theory
himself.