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Historical Research
Part One
Submitted by Colonel (Ret) Louis A. K. Sylvester
An Ancient Mathematician
Archimedes of Syracuse
Archimedes was a Greek mathematician and inventor born in 287BC in
Syracuse, Sicily. He may have been the most towering mathematical figure
of the ancient world. He was a great inventor, but had a lifelong fascination
with geometry. He invented several hydraulic machines, including a device
known as the Archimedean screw, which was applied to drainage and
irrigation. This device is used in many parts of the world today.
Archimedes discovered the law of specific gravity, (the weight of a body
immersed in a liquid) still called Archimedes’ principle. His most
celebrated, purely mathematical works are on the ratio of the cylinder and
the sphere, the ratio of the circumference of a circle to the diameter (better
know as “pi”), on spiral lines, and on the parabola. He wrote several books
and treatises on these matters that have survived to this day; two books on
spheres and cylinders; two books on floating bodies; one on the
measurement of a circle; and one entitled The Sandreckoner , a work that
details a numbering system capable of expressing numbers up to 8x10 to
the 16th power in modern notation.
When the Roman general Marcellus captured Syracuse in 212 BC, he did
so with great difficulty because of the many engines of warfare that
Archimedes devised to defend the city. These devices included catapults
and slings that devastated the ranks of the Roman foot soldiers and the
Roman naval fleet.
Archimedes died in 212BC during the battle for Syracuse. For a more
detailed account of this remarkable mathematician go to http://wwwgroups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Archimedes.html.