BabylonianMathematics

In recent years especially has it been emphasized that the

mathematics used by the Babylonians did not originate with
them, but rather with the non-Semitic Sumerians who lived
just north of the Persian Gulf and south of the Semitic Akkadians.
For at least a thousand years prior to 2500 B. C. the Sumerians
were generally predominant in Babylonia but they were absorbed
into a larger political group by about 2ooo B. C. Notable
engineering works by means of which marshes were drained, and
the overflow of rivers regulated by canals, went back to Sumerian
times, like also their remarkable method of writing in cuneiform
script, a considerable part of their religion and law, and their
system of mathematics, except possibly for certain details.
This system of mathematics was essentially sexagesimal (i)
and while a special symbol for io was constantly employed it
occupied a subordinate position; there was no symbol for IOO
or iooo. One hundred was i.6o + 40 and iooo i6.6o + 40,
but the latter would be written simply as i6,40. Any positive
"integer" a Z c6fo would be of the form a- ..C2,C17CO>CIC-20..
where one or more of the c's may be zero. Thus the system
was relatively positional. Ambiguities arose in a variety of ways
for example, three symbols for unity following another in cunei-
form writing, III, might be 3, or 3.60, or 2.60 + I, or i.602 + z60,
or i-602 + i 6o + i, or i 602 + o-6o+ 2, or yet other forms,
each of them multiplied by 6on where n might be any positive
or negative integer. It was not until the time of the Greeks
that there was a special sign for zero, and often only the
context could suggest when a zero was to be interpolated, if

(I) Surmises as to why 6o was chosen as a base of the number system do not
seem to suggest anything more than that 6o is divisible by a large number of
integers, which might be especially useful in connection with the use of weights
and measures. It is interesting, however, to note that in the equally ancient
Egyptian civilization the decimal system was basic, fromnat least 3500 B. C.

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 64 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

there was doubt as to a blank space at the point in question. These

elements of difficulty, combined with lack of knowledge of
Babylonian mathematical terminology, were potent for almost
a generation in defying the translation, for example, of the
mathematical tablets 85194 and 85210, transcribed and published
in CuneiformnTexts from Babylonian Tablets etc. in the British
Museum (London, part IX, I900), usually referred to as CT IX.
These tablets dating from about 2000 B. C. are only two out
of more than a score in the British Museum.
But while such tablets are of great interest and value, as we
shall later see, there are many others, a knowledge of which
is highly necessary in order to get a true idea of Babylonian
mathematics as scholarship of the present day portrays it. There
are 48 tablets in the State Museum at Berlin, 27 at the University
of Jena, 66 in the Museum of Antiquities at Istanbul, 35 at Yale
University, 6 in the Pierpont Morgan Library Collection, 2i at
the University of Pennsylvania, i6 at the Louvre in Paris, 6 at
Strasbourg National Library and University, 3 at the Royal
Ontario Museum of Archaeology, Toronto, 2 at the Ashmolean
Museum, Oxford, 7 at Brussels, and z in the Bohl collection
at Leyden.
During the latter part of the nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries a number of these tablets were discussed by such
scholars as HINCKS, LENORMANT, OPPERT, KUGLER, HILPRECHT,
LANGDON, PINCHES, SAYCE, THUREAU-DANGIN, UNGNAD, WEIDNER,
ZIMMERN, SPELEERS, GENOUILLAC, and GADD. An admirable
though brief summary of previous work is given in the second
volume of MEISSNER'S Babylonien utnd Assyrien (I925). Many
other scholars contributed to the knowledge of Sumerian, Akka-
dian, and Babylonian grammar, literature, metrology, and
inscriptions. All this was of importance in laying a foundation
for the great advances of the past decade.
It should be borne in mind that tablets which are the basis
of our study of Babylonian mathematics and astronomy, do not
by any means all date from a period long before the wonderful
Greek activity, but from the time of ARCHIMEDES back for two
thousand years or more. Up to a decade ago it was known
that Babylonian astronomical achievements were very remark-
able, leading, it is said, to their discovery of the precession of the

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 65
equinoxes about 340 B. C. by KIDINNU who is said to have
directed an astronomical school at Sippra on the Euphrates.
But accounts of their mathematical attainments were not par-
ticularly interesting. That accounts now teem with interest
is largely due to a young Austrian OTTO NEUGEBAUER who was
born at Innsbruck in I899 and received his doctorate at G6ttingen
in 1926 for a thesis with the title, Die Gruntdlagender dgyptischen
Buchrechnung (2). Even then, he had already started the study
of cuneiform writing. In 1927 and 1928 he published introductory
studies, but by 1929, in the first number of his Studien, we find
not only a critical study of CARL FRANK'S very interesting mono-
graph on Strasbourg tablets, which had appeared in the previous
year (3) but also a joint article with STRUVE, " tUber die Geometrie
des Kreises in Babylonien," both containing extraordinary new
results. Further articles followed (4), setting forth new disco-

(2) In the following year he became a Docent, and was put in charge of the
library of the Mathematical Institute, where in organization and development
he did remarkable work during the next six years. In I93I he became chief
editor of a new periodical Zentralblattffir MkIcathemnatik of which I3 vols. already
published have been of great service to mathematicians; so also for Zentralblatt
fiur Mechanik (vol. I, 1934 +) in which he is joint editor with W. FI{GGE. In
1932 he organized the excellent series Ergibnisse der Mathematik und ihrer Grenz-
gebiete, as an enterprise associated with the Zentralblatt fur Mathematik and i6
volumes have been published already. In I929 he started the publication of
Quellen und Studien zur Geschichte der Mathematik in the form of two serials,
Abteilung A : Quellen and Abteilung B: Studien. Of the latter, two volumes and
the first three parts of a third have appeared (I929-36), and contain much of
value for our present inquiry. Of the three complete volumes of Quellen
(I930-35) the third in two parts is the great work of Dr. NEUGEBAUER which in
this paper we later consider in some detail.
(3) C. FRANK, Strassburger- Keilschrifttexte in sumerischer und babylonischer
Sprache (Schriften der Strassburger Wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft in Heidelberg,
n. s., part 9).
(4) A few of these may be indicated, as follows
(i) "Uber vorgriechische Mathematik", (Hamburg mathem. Einzelschriften,
part 8), I929, i8 p.; also Hamburg Univ., Mathem. Seminar, Abhandlungen, v. 7.
(ii) " Sexagesimalsystem und babylonische Bruchrechnung," I-IV, Studien,
v. I, 1930-3I, p. I83-193, 452-463; V. 2, 1923, p. 199-2I0.
(iii) " Beitrage zur Geschichte der babylonischen Arithmetik," Studien, v. i,
I930, p. I20-I30.
(iv) " Studien zur Geschichte der antiken Algebra I," Studien, v. 2, I932,

p. I-27.
(v) " Reihen in der babylonischen Mathematik " (with WAscuow), Studien,
V. 2, I932, p. 298-304.
(vi) " Bemerkungen uber Quadratwurzeln und Quadratwurzelapproximationen

5
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 66 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

veries which could only have been suggested to a Babylonian scholar

who also had wide mathematical knowledge and training. Many
of these results were embodied in a course of lectures given
at the University of Copenhagen. The first published volume
of these lectures appeared in 1934 with the title Vorlesungen iiber
Geschichte der antiken mathematischen Wissenschaften. Erster
Band, Vorgriechische Mathematik. But this volume was only
a prelude to the third volume of his Quellen, published last year.
This work is entitled Mathematische Keilschrift- Texte and the
first part is a royal octavo volume of 528 pages. It is almost
wholly made up of transcriptions and translations of tablets
and of detailed commentary. There are seven chapters, the
first dealing with table texts, and the six following with texts,
in the Louvre, in the British Museum, in Istanbul, in Strasbourg,
in the Berlin Museum, and in Yale University.
The large quarto second part contains material supplementary
to the first part; a concordance giving the number and location
of all the mathematical tablets; glossaries of Akkadian words,
of ideograms and Summerian words, and names; a bibliography;
6o plates, the first 34 of which are most beautiful photographic
reproductions of texts, while the rest are mostly transcriptions
of these and other tablet documents. Thus, in article, Vorlesungen,
and Quellen 3, we find Neugebauer frequently discussing the same
thing in three different ways. This is often of great assistance
to the amateur trying to get a clear idea of the contents of tablets

in der babylonischen Mathematik " (with H. WASCHOW), Studien, v. 2, 1932,

p. 291-297.
(vii) " Das Pyramidenstumf-Volumen in der vorgriechischen Mathematik,"
Studien, V. 2, I933, p. 347-35 I.
(viii) " Uber die Losung kubischer Gleichungen in Babylonien," Gesellschaft
d. Wissen. zu G6ttingen, mathem.-phys. Kl., Nachrichten, 1933, p. 3I6-32I.
(ix) " Uber die Rolle der Tabellentexte in der babylonischen Mathematik,"
K. Danske Vidanskabernes Selskab, mathematiksfysiske Meddelelser, v. I2, no. 13,
I1934, I4 p.
(x) " Serientexte in der babylonischen Mathematik," Studien, v. 3, I934,
p. Io6-II4.
The student interested in Babylonian mathematical literature before I929
may refer to my Bibliography in the CHACE-BULL-MANNING-ARCHIBALD work
on The Rhind Mathematical Papyrus (Math. Assoc. America, I927-29). A very
useful later Bibliography was published by Dr. KURT VOGEL, in his " Babylonische
Mathematik," Bayer. Bldtter f. d. Gymnasialschulzvesen, v. 7I, I935, p. I6-23.
This latter list shows the impetus that NEUGEBAUER'S work has given to the subject.

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 67
discussed, because NEUGEBAUER's powers of lucid and effective
exposition are by no means comparable to his other extraordinary
gifts.
So much for sources to which one may turn for surveying
investigations in the field of Babylonian mathematics. Let
us now once more take up the question of indicating the nature
of the mathematics known and employed.
Again and again has NEUGEBAUER emphasized the fundamental
role which tables play in the mathematics of the Babylonians,
and the fact that discussion of them occupies nearly ioo pages
of his last remarkable work bears witness to this fact. Ordinary
multiplication tables are very numerous and are almost always
the products of a certain number by i, 2, 3, .., 20, then by 30,
40, and 50. For example on tablets of about I500 B. C. at Brus-
sels (S) are tables of 7, 10, I2, I6, 24 each multiplied by a series
of such numbers. A number of tablets give the squares of
numbers (6) i to 50, and also the cubes, square-roots and cube-
roots of numbers. But the tables of square-roots and cube-roots
are really just tables of squares and cubes expressed differ-
ently (7). As an example of an arithmetical operation in the

(5) L. SPELEERS,Recueil des Inscriptions de l'Asie Anterieure des Musees Royaux

du Cinquantenaire a Bruxelles, Brussels, I925, P. 29, 94-95. In the University
of Pennsylvania there are twenty-three tablets containing multiplication tables,
in part or complete, and dated for the most part about I300 B. C.; but a few
are dated 2000 B. C. The multipliers are such numbers as: 2, 6, 9, I8, 30, 36,
90, 432, 450, 540, 960, IO80, 2I60; see H. V. HILPRECHT, Mathematical, MlIetrological
and Chronological Tablets, Philadelphia, i9o6, P. 57-6I, 68-69. See also British
Museum, A Guide to the Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities, third ed., London,
Philadelphia, I906, p. 69, and plate X. See also British Museum, A Guide to
the Babvlonian and Assyrian Antiquities, third ed., London, I9zz, p. i6I. For
references to others, see Quellen 3, part I, p. 10-I2.
(6) For example, in the University of Pennsylvania, dating from about t300
B. C,; see HILPRECHT, Mathematical, Metrological and Chronological Tablets,
Philadelphia, I906, p. 69, and plate X, See also British Museum, A Guide to the
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities, third ed., London, 1922, p. I6i, and GE-
NOUILLAC, Premieres Recherches Arche'ologiques a Kich, V. I-2, I924-2 5, and
Quellen 3, part i, p. 69-71.
(7) The two tablets with square roots in the University of Pennsylvania date
from about zooo B. C.; see HILPRECHT,ibid., p. 62-63, and pl. i6. A tablet
in the British Museum dating from about I900 B. C. and containing tables of
square roots and cube roots is described in F. LENORMANT, Essai sur un Document
mathematique chaldeen, Paris, I868 (for further references in this connection see
my Bibliography). For a tablet with squares, cubes, etc., of a given number see

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 68 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

course of a problem of about 2ooo B. C. we may note a passage

from a tablet discussed in the monograph of FRANK (P. 2i) already
referred to: "... the square of I3, 20 iS 2, 57, 46, 40. Add 2,
57, 46, 40 to 50, 33, 30. It is 53, 3I, 6, 40. The square root of
53, 31, 6, 40 is 56, 40." The last two numbers in this quotation
are respectively said to be four-place and two-place numbers.
The only known table of squares of two-place numbers is on a
tablet jn the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford (8); it dates from
about 500 B. C. It is noteworthy in another respect, namely
that in the case of four numbers there is a sign for zero. For
example (24, 30)2 - IO, ., I5, that is (1470)2 =z I6o900.
There is a single tablet of a very interesting type in the Berlin
Museum (VAT 8492) where for n --- I, 2, ... 20, 30, 40, 50 we
have (g) not only n2 and n3, but also n2 + n3. At first NEUGE-
BAUER could see no application for such a table, or even for the
tables of cubes, but finally, he surmised that they were to be
used in solving cubic equations which had been reduced to a
" normal form." In British Museum tablets of about i8oo B.C.,
reproduced in C. T. IX, are six problems which seem naturally
to lead to one-term, three-term, and four-term cubic equations,
but the solution of only three of these fits in with his theory.
The two-term case leads simply to finding the cube-root of a
number, and two of the three-term cases lead to

(tX)3 + (vX)2 - 4, 12;

from the Berlin tablet the solution tx - 6 may be found imme-
diately. Two of the problems seem to lead naturally to the
e quation
X3---(i -jub)x2-bx + a -o

and this is not reduced to the normal form. But on the contrary
the text gives (in the case of the second of the problems)

British Museum, A Guide to the Babylonian..., I922, P. i6i. See also M. CANTOR,
" Babylonische Quadratwurzeln und Kubikwurzeln," Zeitschrift fur Assyriologie,
V. 2I, I900, P. IIo-II5. For a number of other references to tablets in Berlin,
Istanbul, etc. see Quellen 3, part i, p. 68-75.
(8) Quellen 3, part i, p. 72-73, and part 2, plate 34.
(g) Studien, v. 2, 1932, P. 303-304; Gottingen, Nachrichten, 1933 (see above),
P. 320; Quellen 3, part I, P. 76-77; Vorles-ungen, P. 32-33, 195, I99-200.

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 69
1LX2y+ XY X y z -f- I

Itb b b [b 21,

whence it is inferred that x/b -- 3, y/b 2and (z + i)/pjb 3, 30.

NEUGEBAUER contends that the Babylonians were quite capable
of using a linear transformation --z
Z x + c to reduce the general
four-term cubic equation x3 T a1 C2 -t- a2X +a3 -- o to the
form U3 + b1u2 + b2 o. And also by multiplying this equation
i/l3 and setting u b1w, and a -b2/b3, of arriving at the
equation in the normal form .3 w2 But any case of the
aO

solution of the general cubic equation in this way has yet to be

found.
There is a large group of tables to which NEUGEBAUER pays
a great deal of attention, namely the tables of reciprocals. He
uses the convenient notation I/8 -- n, so that in a Babylonian
table of reciprocals we would find n.fn- 6o0, where p is equal to
zero, or some positive or negative integer. The tables usually
consists of two columns of numbers such as
4 'S
5 12
6 I0
8 7, 30
9 6, 40
io b
27 2, 13, 20
1, 21 44, 26, 40
where the products of pairs of numbers on the same line may
always be considered as 6o. If such numbers as 7 or i i occur
in the first column the remark is made " does not divide "; these
are the irregular numbers. The regular divisors must be of the
form a -2a. 3 5y (where a, /, y are each either zero, or a
positive integer) if the corresponding number is to have
a finite number of terms in the second column. By means
of a table of reciprocals division is changed into multiplication
b/a b?d.
From the above it may be correctly surmised that the Baby-
lonians either never attempted to divide anything by 7 (or other
number not of the form a, above) or else arranged the problem
in which such a divisor might occur so that the divisor would

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 70 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

disappear before the final result was reached. Since such approx-
imations to 1/7 as 7/48 ;845, and I3/90 = ;8,40, are readily
written down it might be thought that the Babylonian may have
used them; but Dr. NEUGEBAUER has kindly informed me that he
never met with such a case, though he himself has used the first
of these approximations in one of his discussions.
To give a suggestion of the extraordinary extent of some
tables of reciprocals, particular attention may be drawn to tablet
AO 6456, of about 350 B. C., in the Louvre (Io), on which there
are 252 entries of one-place to seventeen-place divisors, and
one-place to fourteen place reciprocals. Two examples may be
cited
2,39, ,j6, 6, 48 22,34,48,25?17,19,46,49,52,35,33,20
2, 59, 21, 40,48,54 20, 4, I6, 22, 28, 44, 14, 57, 40, 4, 56, 7, 46, 40

In each case n.Ji may be 'thought of as 6o19.

We have seen how tables of cubes of numbers may have appli-
cations, but similar consideration of tables of powers is fully
as interesting; such tables are found in Istanbul tablets (iI)
(Ist. 0 38I6, 3826, 3862 4583). In his Vorlesungen (p. 20i)
NEUGEBAUER stated definitely that we have tables for en from
n1 =i1 to i O for c = 9, c - I6, c = 1,40, C = 3.45. This is
highly misleading, since, with the badly mutilated. text now
before us, we see that not more than 6 out of the 40 stated entries
are given completely and correctly, while many are entirely
lacking, and others very fragmentary.
One use for such tables is in connection with problems of
compound interest. In Babylonia the paying of interest for the
loan of produce or of precious metal was common. Sumerian
tablets indicate that the rate of interest varied from 20 to 30
percent, the higher rate being for produce. At a later period
the rate was 52 to 25 percent for metal and 20 to 331 percent
for produce (I2). In a Louvre tablet (AO 6770) of about 2000

(IO) QUellen 3, part i, p. 14-22.

(I i) Quellen 3, part 1, p. 77-79.
(12) I. JASTROW,Jr. The Civilization of Babylonia and Assyria, Philadelphia,
1915, P. 326, 338; C. H. W. JOHNs,Babylonian and Assyrian Laws, Contracts
and Letters, New York, 1904, P. 251, 255-256. See also D. E. SMTTH, History
of Mathematics, Boston, v. 2, 1925, p. 560.

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 7I

B. C. there is a problem (I3) to find how long it would take for

a sum of money to double itself at compound interest, interest
being computed at 20 %b The problem, then, is to find x in the
equation
(I + O;I2)Y' 2a

rjhe correct result is approximately 3 ;48 years; but the text

gives x =- 4 0;2, 23, 20 = 3;57, 26, 40 years. ft would
seem as if a table of powers may have been used to find
I ;I24 - 24, 24, 57, 36

which was too large. How the amount to subtract from 4

namely, 0 2, 23, 20, was determined, is not indicated in the
text, and has not yet been conjectured. The example is
especially interesting as illustrating that four thousand years ago
solutions were found of exponential equations a = b, where x
was not integral.
A Yale tablet (YBC 4669) leads (14) to an annual interest
formula, b _ a (I + z)n, but here n - 3, while z o;i2, b -
and a 0; 34, 43, 20.
Two Berlin tablets (I5) (VAT 852I and 8528) dating from
about 2000 B. C. consider problems involving a five-year plan,
with a combination of simple and compound interest, suggestive
of what may have been customary in ancient Babylonia. If P
is an amount of principal, r the rate of interest for year (here 20
2P will be the amount at simple interest at the end of five years.
If this 2P is then considered as principal 4P will be the amount
at the end of a second five-year period. Thus the amount at the
end of any year is given by the formula
A 24P (I + rm)
where o<m<5, and n is the number of five-year periods. The
particular case when m o is considered, namely A - 2nP,
and one problem is, how many five year periods would it take for
a sum P to amount to A. The solution of the problem in
question is very simple, namely P I, n 6, A = , 4. But

(13) Quellen 3, part 2, p. 40-41.

(14) Quellen 3, part I, p. 506.
(I5) Quellen 3, part I, p. 351-367; Vorlesungen, p. 197-199.

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 72 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

NEUGEBAUER believes that the text discussion implies a good deal

more, even possibly the knowledge of something like the
equivalent of logarithms to the base 2, since n log2(AJP).
There are problems of another type involving the power of
numbers on a Louvre tablet (i6) (AO 6484) of about 30o B1 C.
One problem the geometric series of ten terms with i as the first
term and 2 the constant multiplier is summed correctly,

2 2
i=o0 17,3 -0--123.
But this 17,3 is said to be equal to the sum of 8,31 (=~ 8,32 -- T)
and 8,32, that is, of 29 + 29 -i, or 210 -i. Does this imply
a knowledge of EUCLID'S formula for the sum of ten terms in
the geometric progression leading to (210 - 1)/(2 - 1)?
On the same tablet the sum of the squares of the first ten
integers is given as in the right-hand member of

2 =- (1.1/3 + 10.2/3)55.

Now if this be generalized we get

nn
j2 ==(I 1/3 + ne2/3) E i.
t I i= I

Was this formula known to the Babylonians? Since

n
jzzz
; (I/2)n (n + I)
* I

was derived by the Pythagoreans, we have

n I
j2 --n +
6 (n I) (2n + I),

which is practically equivalent to a result in work of Archimedes.

We are of course here referring to a tablet not very far removed
from the time of ARCHIMEDES.
In a Strasbourg tablet (no. 362), dating from about 2ooo B. C.
we find four terms of another geometric series (17) of which the
first term is I ;2, and the constant multiplier is 2. The numbers
of workers on sections of an embankment, discussed in the same
tablet, are in arithmetic progression, namely, 6o, 8o, ioo.
In another Strasbourg tablet (no. 364) there are three pro-

(i6) Quellen3, parti, p. 96-I03, and part z, platei; Studien,v.z2,1932, p.302-303.

(X7) Quellen 3, part I, p. 243.

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 73
blems (I8) which involve the division of a right triangle into six
areas by lines drawn parallel to one side (as in the figure). These
areas are in arithmetical progression, the first term being A6
- 140, the common diffe-
rence being 3,2o and the last b, 1,20
term Al i8,z0. In the first At= 18,20
problem b4= 40,A1 A 8.=1 820 J 16; 0
A2 i5,o, b1-b2-b2 A2 15, 0
-

b3 - 13;20 are given; the b53;ZO

problem is to find 1l, 1212, 413, A3=7zI7, '-10
/
bl, b2, and b3. Now we could .b 4 Q
at once write down n

11(b + b2) - I 66 2

12(b2+ be) I 5,o Ar,5) O

and from proportion in

11 1)-3;20 o b3-40 j
2 3
whence, the six unknowns can be determined from the six equa-
tions. In writing down these equations the following results
familiar to the Babylonians were used: (a) The sides about
corresponding angles of two similar right triangles are proportion-
al; (b) The area of a trapezoid with one side perpendicular to
the parallel sides is one-half the product of the length of this
perpendicular and the sum of the lengths of the parallel sides.
They knew also, (c), that the area of a rectangle is the product
of the lengths of two adjacents sides; and that the area of a right
triangle is equal to one-half the product of the lengths of the
sides about the right angle.
In the second problem of this figure b4 = 40, 14 + 15- 30,
A1 = i8,2o, A2 - I5e o, A6 = 140 and the eight unknowns,
bl, b2 b3, b6, 11,12 13, 16 are to be determined. These can be found
at once from the relations 11(b, + b2) i8 20,
-

l2(b2 + I3 40, and

b1-b 2 b2-b 3 b3-40 4o-b1 b6
_

___12 . 13 _ 6
'1 3E3Z

(i8) Quellen 3, part I, p. 248-a49, 252-254; Studiei', v. I, 1929, p. 74-77;

Vorlesungen, p. I8o-I8I.

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 74 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

In
the third problem - b2) I8, 20,
Al I1(b, +
Aw2 -12(b + b43) - I5i O, A A - 12(14 d- 15)o
(b4 + bG) - 13, 20, bl b2 13; 20, -

2(b2 b2) - 13;20 and the following io unknowns are sought

b,, b2, b3, b4, be, 1k,12, 13, 14, + 15, 16. They may be readily
found when we have written down the following additional
relations from geometrical considerations:
b,-b2 b2-b3 b3- b4 b4-b6 b6

11 12 13 14+ 15 16
Thus there are Io equations to determine the Io unknowns.
The solutions indicated above are not actually to be found in the
text; but, from a number of other problems, where solutions
are given, there can be little doubt as to the method employed
by the Babylonians. The problem is further suggestive of
mathematics studied for its own sake just as the following problem
40 of the Rhind papyrus also using arithmetical progression:
Divide ioo loaves among 5 men in such a way that the shares
received shall be in arithmetical progression and that I/7 of the
sum of the largest three shall be equal to the sum of the smallest
two. Another problem on a Strassburg tablet (no. 362) is to
divide ioo shekles of silver among ten brothers so that the shares
shall be in arithmetical progression (i9).
Yet another Strasbourg tablet (no. 363) has problems leading
to quadratic equations and their solution. One of these problems
is as follows: The sums of the areas of two squares (the lengths
of whose sides are x and y) is equal to a given quantity A(= 37, 5).
The side x of the larger square is equal to a certain quantity
u + d(= Io) and the side y of the smaller is equal to
a
-_u( 2/3 u)+ d2 ( 5)
That is
a
x2 + y2 A, x U + d, y = u + d2,

whence, if WP
-f u,
W2H + 2(d1f + d2a) X- A -(d,2 + d22) _

a2 + /2 2
a + P2
or

(i9) Quellen 3, p. 239-242; Studien, v.', 1930, p. 120-123; Vorlesungen, p. 174-175.

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 75

w =
2 X { <(dflp + d2a)2+ (a2 + 2)[A - (d12+ d22)]--

(dllB d- d2a)}.

Now every single step of the solution on the tablet is equivalent

to substitution in this formula. There are scores of problems
which prove this amazing fact that the Babylonians of 2ooo B. C.
were familiar with the equivalent of our formula for the solution
of a quadratic equation. Until I929 no one suspected that such
a result was known before the time of HERON OF ALEXANDRIA
two thousand years later.
In a Berlin tablet (VAT 8520) we have a quadratic equation
for reciprocal numbers (20)

a
(I) Y]- (y-+Y) D,Y Y [

where oa - 6, ,6 = 3, D - o;30
The first step in the solution is to make a transformation

(2) {X1-= (I9-a)y,

-
x2 ay 2

from which xl-X2 = /D, and x1x2 = a( - a). Hence xj

and - x2 are roots of the equation
-2 /_ Dw -a( - a) 0

(3) Xx2J
+_ + N
22
The text leads exactly to equations (3) from which x1 = I0;30
and x2 4. Then Yi and Y2 are found from equations (2)
Yi = 1;30 Y2 = 0;40, and they are tested by substitution in
equations (i). NEUGEBAUER emphasises that here, as in other
texts, we have a transformation to a " normal form " in which the
coefficient of the squared term in the quadratic equation is unity.
The use of both positive roots of the quadratic equation is also
noteworthy; a number of other examples of this kind might
be cited, in accordance with NEUGEBAUER'S interpretation.
It is, however, important that the reader should consult Dr. KURT
VOGEL'S "1Bemerkungen zu den quadratischen Gleichungen der

(20) Quellen 3, part I, p. 350-351; Vorlesungen, p. i86-I87.

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 76 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

babylonischenMathematik" (Osiris, v. 1, 1936, p. 707-7I7), since

other possible Babylonian discussion of quadratic equations is
here clearly presented, and quite different from that of
NEUGEBAUER, while entirely in keeping with all texts published
before Quellen 3, at least. According to this discussion also there
is no question as to two roots of a quadratic equation, but always
a perfectly definite one, even when both roots are positive.
The continuation of our examples of problems which are
pure algebra naturally leads us to the series and other texts
at Yale University (2i). They contain nothing but the statement
of problems with no suggestion as to the method of their solution.
On I7 tablets are over goo problems, from I7 on YBIC 4698 (8
x 5 cm.) to about 2oo on YBC 4668 (i6- X io cm.). There
are problems on the calculation of volumes, of material for
workers, and of interest, but most of the problems involve various
types of equations; zero, and negative numbers in right hand
members of equations, occur several times. By series-texts
is meant texts in which all the exercises are of a given type. For
example on YBC 4709 are found 55 pairs of simultaneous equa-
tions, included in the following general form:

xy - IO, O and (ax + by)2 + cx2 dy2 _ B,

the solution of each of which leads to a biquadratic equation
which is quadratic in x2. Since xy = IO, O for all the examples,
problems 49-52 are
[3x + 5y - 2(x- y)]2 + x2 + y2 -8, 23, 20
+ 2(X2 + y2) 8, 45, 0
(X2 + y2) 7, 40, 0
2(X2 + y2) 7, i 8, 20
In YBC 4668 the problems are of the type xy - Io, 0 and
a(x + y)2 + b(x y) + c- o the solution of which leads to
general biquadratic equations. Examples 42 and 45 here are
2, 30(x y) - (x + y)2 i 6, 40
Te (X + y)2 - I, O(X - y) mIe 40
These negative terms in the right hand members are certainly
(21) Quellen 3, part I, p. 381-5i6, and part 2, p. 50, plates 33, 34, 57-60;
Vorlesungen, p. I88-I93; Studien, v. 3, 1934, p. I06-II4.

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 77
most extraordinary, because such conceptions were not current
in Europe even 2500 years later. In this connection one may
recall the extract from a text which NEUGEBAUER gives (22) (the
words tab and lal correspond to + and-; 37 40 lal 3)
26, 2I tab
31, 23, 30 tab
31, 47, 30 tab
23, I5 tab
7, 55 tab
II, 57, 30 lal
25, 2, 30 lal
3I, 20 lal
31, 50 lal
25, 48, 30 lal
II, 43, 30 lal
9,9 tab

ta
36

10I

10-

Now if the corresponding points be plotted (as in the figure)

they lie on a wave line exhibiting periodic observations, which
are to be a topic for discussion in NEUGEBAUER'S third volume
of Vorlesungen. The idea here suggested seems very extra-
ordinary.
Returning to our series-texts we note that an equation of the
sixth degree (or a quadratic in x3) results from the solutions of
equationsof the type xy = Io, o, a1(x2/y) + a2(y2/x) + a3 0
(YBC 4668) (23). The general cubic equation comes up in
the discussion of volumes of frustums of a pyramid, as the result

(22) Vorlesungen,p. I 8.
(23) Quellen 3, part I, p. 460.

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 78 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

of eliminating x and z from the equations Z(X2 + y2) - A, z

(ay + b), x -c (YBC 4708) (24). Another example in a Berlin
tablet (VAT 7537) is interesting because of the irregular fractions
occuring in the coefficients (25): xy - Io, o and
I
- r-1' [(X +
X2 + y)2 - IO,o] + 3y2 S - I6, 40
'3 LI9 J
And finally, as an example of four equations in four unknowns
(YBC 4714) (26):
_4I
X X=2 5z, 30, -xI - xl x2 = x2 X= 3 X3 -X40
I 7
NEUGEBAUER has pointed out the intimate connection of the
Yale series-texts with texts in the Berlin Museum and British
Museum. The original group of series-texts must have contained
thousands of problems. The fact that examples cited above, and
hundreds of other problems involving two unknowns, always
have the same solutions, 30 and 20 does not affect NEUGEBAUER'S
conviction, that they were intended as illustrations of types of
problems, to the solution of which general methods were to be
applied.
Let us now consider certain other geometrical results known
to the Babylonians: (a) The volume of a rectangular paralello-
piped is equal to the product of the lengths of its three adjacent
edges, and the volume cut off by drawing a plane through a pair
of opposite edges is half of this amount. (b) The volume of a
right circular cone is equal to the product of the area of its base
by its altitude. (c) The volume of the frustum of a cone, or of
a square pyramid, is equal to the product of its altitude and the
area of a medial section (27). But the Babylonians had also an
accurate formula for the volume of the frustum of a square pyramid,
namely (28) V h + (i 2 where a and
a2 are the lengths of the sides of the square bases. This is exactly

(24) Quellen 3, part I, p. 399-400.

(25) Vorlesungen, p. I93; Quellen 3, part 1, p. 475.
(26) Quellen 3, part I, p. 500.
(27) Quellen 3, part I, p. I76; Studien, v. I, 1929, p. 86-87; Vorlesungen, p. I71.
(28) Quellen 3, part I, p. I50, I62, I87-I88; Vorlesungen, p. I71; Studien, v. I,
I1929, p. 86-87.

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 79
equivalent to the formula V-- (h/3) (a,2 + aa2 + a22), known
to the Egyptian of I850 B. C. But it is the Babylonian form
which was known to HERON OF ALEXANDRIA (Opera, V. 5, 1914,
p. 30-35), in the early part of the Christian era.
As to a circle the Babylonians of 2000 B. C. knew that the
angle in a simicirele was a right angle, a result until recently
attributed to THALES OF MILETUS. They considered aT = 3,
and the area of a circle equal to one-twelfth of the square of the
length of its circumference. It is not a little curious that a people
who did such remarkable things in algebra should have used
a value of -r so much poorer than that of the Egyptian, namely
256/8i. On the other hand, while there is not a single document
to show that the Egyptian knew even the simplest case of the
so-called Pythagorean theorem (29), there is not the slightest
doubt that the Babylonian knew the general result. This may
be illustrated by various examples. In a British Museum text
of 2ooo B. C. (B. M. 85I94) the following problems are solved (30):
(a) To calculate the length c of a chord of a circle from its sagitta,
a, and the length of its circumference (let d, the diameter - one
third of the circumference); (b) To calculate the length of the
sagitta from the chord of a circle and its circumference. Now
every step of the work in the tablet (where c -12, d = 20, a= 2)
is equivalent to substitution in the formulae

C= [d2-- (d =2a)2] and

a- [d-
- 2 C2].

But again in another British Museum tablet (BM 85i 96) is a

problem (3I) of a beam of length I originally upright against a
wall but the upper end has slid down the distance h; the distance d
that the lower end has moved from the wall is determined from

(29) Perhaps a similar assertion may be made with regard to the Babylonians,
namely that there is not a single text where it is found that they divided the
circumference of a circle into 360 equal parts, which has been current from the
time of Hipparchus. The Babylonian division of the circumference into 8, 12,
120, 240, and 480 parts, is known. See my discussion of this question in Science,
n. s., v. 71, 3I Jan. 1930, p. II7-II8; and v. 73, I6 Jan. I93I, p. 68.
(30) Quellen 3, part i, p. I59, I8o; Studien, v. 1, I9Z9, p. 90-92; Vorlesungen,
p. I68.
(3I) Quellen 3, part 2, P. 53.

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 80 RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD

the formula d V12 - (I - h)2. In another problem when I

and d are know h is found from h = 1 - \/12 - d2 A third
illustration is found in a Louvre tablet (32) (AO 6484).
In all of these cases the square roots of the numbers considered
are always exact. But there are cases of square roots of non-
square numbers such as I700. This occurs in an Akkadian tablet
of about 2000 B. C. where it is a question of determining the
diagonal (33) of a rectangle whose sides are of length ;4o and ;io.
It is worked out twice seemingly by two approximation formulae.
If d be the length of the diagonal and a and b the length of the
sides, then, approximately,
b2
(i) d a + -; and
2a

(ii) d a+ 2ab2.

Now (i) is the formula used, more than once, by HERON OF ALEXAN-
DRIA two thousand years later (34) in approximating the square
root of a number. In(ii) the dimensions of the second term of the
right hand member are incorrect; NEUGEBAUER found that a good
approximation was
2ab2
d a +-
2a2 + b2

and since in the problem in question I/(2a2 + b2) is I2/Il Ig

he suggested that this factor may well have been neglected.
The first approximation was used by the Babylonians to find (35)
-12 for V2, and I7/24 for I/A2. In BM 85I94 there is a very
suggestive attempt to approximate A/22 by a step equivalent
to that of seeking the solutions of the Diophantine equation (36)

(32) Quellen 3, part i, p. I04; Studien, v. 2, I932, p. 294.

(33) Quellen 3, part I, p. 279-280, 282, 286-287, and part 2, plates I7, 44;
Vorlesungen, p. 33-36; Studien, V. 2, I932, p. 29I-294.
(34) It may be expressed differently; if A a2 + c then we have as the first

approximation to + , cx1 = - (aa +- for a second approximation

( ,+ ); and so on.

(35) Quellen 3, part I, p. IOO, I04; Vorlesungen, p. 37; Studien, v. 2, I932,

p. 294-295. I5[I2 is obtained by HERON'S second approximation.
(36) Quellen 3, part i, p. 172; Studien, v. 2, I932, p. 295-297, 309.

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 BABYLONIAN MATHEMATICS 8I

y2 + 22 X2 when2 5y. The values y 24-

xc- 5-) are found in the text. It is easy to verify that y iz_
x 4-*-is another pair of solutions, so that the required y lies
between i 2 and i-:8. A closer approximation might be readily
found.
While many other things in NEUGEBAUER'Smonumental and
extraordinary work might be singled out for comment, the
illustrations already chosen will suffice to indicate the wonderful
fact that real and varied algebra, without any algebraic notation,
was developed by the Babylonians 4000 years ago. As

HEATH remarks (37), it is equally extraordinary that

" these developments in arithmetic and algebra should have remained, for
most of I8oo years at all events, unknown to, or at least without (so far as we
can judge) any traceable effect upon, the Greek pioneers in the same subjects.
The first extant Greek treatises which give arithmetical solutions of quadratic
equations are those of HERON and DIOPHIANTUS. If any Greek mathematician
can be supposed to have known, or assimilated, the ancient Babylonian arithmetic
and algebra, we can think of no one more likely to have done so than HIPPARCHUS,
who evidently knew in all details the results of Babylonian observations and
research in astronomy. The discoveries about the Babylonian algebra in any
case add fresh interest to the Arabian, attribution to HIPPARCHUS of a work on
the art of algebra, upon which ABU'L WAFA wrote a commentary. Did HIPPARCI-,S
write a book on algebra by way of making known what he found of the nature
of algebra in ancient Babylonian tablets and adapting it for use in astronomical
and other problems. The passage of PLUTARCH(De Stoicorurn repugnantiis, c. 29)
in which he classes HIPPARCHUS among the ' arithmeticians' may perhaps be
thought to favour such a supposition; but, unless and until fresh documents
come to light, the question will presumably remain unanswered. "

Dr. VOGELsuggests that traces of Babylonian algebraic thought

may he found in the writings of DIOPHANTUS.
Last February Doctor NEUGEBAUERwrote to me that he had in
preparation an Ergdnzungsheft to his " MKT " (Mathematische
Keilschrift- Texte), containing much new material. It seems
unthinkable, that means will not be found indefinitely to assure
that this young genius may continue his wonderful scholarly
achievements under the best possible conditions.
Brown University RAYMOND CLARE ARCHIBALD.
Providence, R. I.
April, 1936.

(37) T. L. HEATH, A Manual of Greek Mathematics, Oxford, 1931, p. 529-530.

6
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