From this we derive the modern day usage of 60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour, and 360 degrees in a circle. The Babylonian system of mathematics was sexagesimal (base-60) numeral system. The Babylonian tablet YBC 7289 gives an approximation to accurate to five decimal places. The majority of recovered clay tablets date from 1800 to 1600 BC, and cover topics which include fractions, algebra, quadratic and cubic equations and the Pythagorean theorem. Written in Cuneiform script, tablets were inscribed while the clay was moist, and baked hard in an oven or by the heat of the sun. In contrast to the scarcity of sources in Egyptian mathematics, our knowledge of Babylonian mathematics is derived from some 400 clay tablets unearthed since the 1850s. Thus Babylonian mathematics remained constant, in character and content, for nearly two millennia. In respect of content there is scarcely any difference between the two groups of texts. In respect of time they fall in two distinct groups: one from the Old Babylonian period (1830-1531 BC), the other mainly Seleucid from the last three or four centuries BC. Babylonian mathematical texts are plentiful and well edited. The diagonal displays an approximation of the square root of 2 in four sexagesimal figures, which is about six decimal figures.ġ + 24/60 + 51/60 2 + 10/60 3 = 1.41421296.īabylonian mathematics (also known as Assyro-Babylonian mathematics ) refers to any mathematics of the people of Mesopotamia, from the days of the early Sumerians to the fall of Babylon in 539 BC. 1.4 Neo-Babylonian mathematics (700 BC–400 AD)īabylonian clay tablet YBC 7289 with annotations.1.3 Old Babylonian mathematics (2000–1000 BC).
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