HELLENISTIC

MATHEMATICS

Sagales, Mae Christian, V

What is HELLENISTIC MATHEMATICS?

– In the 1st century BCE, Heron (or Hero) was another

great Alexandrian inventor, best known in mathematical
circles for Heronian triangles (triangles with integer sides
and integer area), Heron's Formula for finding the area of
a triangle from its side lengths, and Heron's Method for
iteratively computing a square root.
Finding the area:
Iteratively computing a square root:
- In particular, Alexandria in Egypt became a great centre of
learning under the beneficent rule of the Ptolemies, and its
famous Library soon gained a reputation to rival that of the
Athenian Academy. The patrons of the Library were arguably the
first professional scientists, paid for their devotion to research.
Among the best known and most influential mathematicians who
studied and taught at Alexandria were Euclid, Archimedes,
Eratosthenes, Heron, Menelaus and Diophantus.
 Alexandria in Egypt
(Hypatia of Alexandria)

– Hypatia of Alexandria was the first woman to make a substantial

contribution to the development of mathematics.

Hypatia was the daughter of the mathematician and philosopher Theon of

Alexandria and it is fairly certain that she studied mathematics under the
guidance and instruction of her father. It is rather remarkable that Hypatia
became head of the Platonist school at Alexandria in about 400 AD. There
she lectured on mathematics and philosophy, in particular teaching the
philosophy of Neoplatonism. Hypatia based her teachings on those of 
Plotinus, the founder of Neoplatonism, and Iamblichus who was a developer
of Neoplatonism around 300 AD.
Who is Euclid?
(EUCLID OF ALEXANDRIA – The Father of
Geometry)

– Euclid is often referred to as the “Father of Geometry”, and he

wrote perhaps the most important and successful mathematical
textbook of all time, the “Stoicheion” or “Elements”, which
represents the culmination of the mathematical revolution which
had taken place in Greece up to that time. He also wrote works on
the division of geometrical figures into into parts in given ratios, on
catoptrics (the mathematical theory of mirrors and reflection), and
on spherical astronomy (the determination of the location of
objects on the “celestial sphere”), as well as important texts on
optics and music.
ARCHIMEDES OF SYRACUSE

– Another Greek mathematician who studied at Alexandria in the

3rd Century BCE was Archimedes, although he was born, died
and lived most of his life in Syracuse, Sicily (a Hellenic Greek
colony in Magna Graecia). Today, Archimedes is widely
considered to have been one of the greatest mathematicians of
antiquity, if not of all time, in the august company of
mathematicians such as Newton and Gauss.
Eratosthenes

– Eratosthenes of Cyrene was a Greek polymath: a mathematician,

geographer, poet, astronomer, and music theorist. He was a man of
learning, becoming the chief librarian at the Library of Alexandria.
– He is best known for being the first person known to calculate the
circumference of the Earth, which he did by using the extensive survey
results he could access in his role at the Library; his calculation was
remarkably accurate.[2][3] He was also the first to calculate Earth's axial
tilt, which also proved to have remarkable accuracy.[4] He created the first
global projection of the world, incorporating parallels and meridians based
on the available geographic knowledge of his era.
Heron
(Hero of Alexandria
Greek mathematician)
- Sometimes called Hero, Heron of Alexandria was an important geometer
and worker in mechanics. Perhaps the first comment worth making is
how common the name Heron was around this time and it is a difficult
problem in the history of mathematics to identify which references to
Heron are to the mathematician described in this article and which are
to others of the same name. There are additional problems of
identification which we discuss below.
- Heron or Hero of Alexandria was an important geometer and worker in
mechanics who invented many machines including a steam turbine. His
best known mathematical work is the formula for the area of a triangle
in terms of the lengths of its sides.
Menelaus 

– Although we know little of Menelaus of Alexandria's life Ptolemy records

astronomical observations made by Menelaus in Rome on
the 14th January in the year 98. These observation included that of the 
occultation of the star Beta Scorpii by the moon.

– He also makes an appearance in a work by Plutarch who describes a

conversation between Menelaus and Lucius in which Lucius apologises
to Menelaus for doubting the fact that light, when reflected, obeys the
law that the angle of incidence equals the angle of reflection.
DIOPHANTUS
(DIOPHANTUS OF ALEXANDRIA)

– Diophantus was a Hellenistic Greek (or possibly Egyptian, Jewish or even

Chaldean) mathematician who lived in Alexandria during the 3rd Century CE. He
is sometimes called “the father of algebra”, and wrote an influential series of
books called the “Arithmetica”, a collection of algebraic problems which greatly
influenced the subsequent development of number theory.
– He also made important advances in mathematical notation, and was one of
the first mathematicians to introduce symbolism into algebra, using an abridged
notation for frequently occurring operations, and an abbreviation for the
unknown and for the powers of the unknown. He was perhaps the first to
recognize fractions as numbers in their own right, allowing positive rational
numbers for the coefficients and solutions of his equations.
– . Inparticular, Alexandria in Egypt became a great center of
learning under the beneficent rule of the Ptolemies, and its
famous Library soon gained a reputation to rival that of the
Athenian Academy. The patrons of the Library were arguably the
first professional scientists, paid for their devotion to research.
Among the best known and most influential mathematicians who
studied and taught at Alexandria were Euclid, Archimedes,
Eratosthenes, Heron, Menelaus and Diophantus.
– Archimedes spent most of his life in Syracuse, Sicily, but
he also studied for a while in Alexandria. He is probably
best known as an engineer and inventor, but in the light
of his recent discoveries, he is now considered one of the
greatest pure mathematicians of all time. Archimedes
modern history.
 Spherical Triangle

– Heron was an Alexandrian inventor

who lived in the first century BCE.
He is best known for his Heronian
triangles and Heron's Method for
computing a square root. He was
also the first mathematician to
grapple with the concept of -1
(although he had no idea how to
treat it).
– Menelaus of Alexandria, who lived between the first and
second centuries CE, was the first to discover geodesics
on curved surfaces as natural analogues of straight lines
on a flat plane. His book "Sphaerica" dealt with sphere
geometry and its application in astronomical observations
and calculations, as well as introducing the concept of the
spherical triangle (a figure made up of three great circle
arcs that he dubbed "trilaterals").
 Conic Sections of Apollonius

But Alexandria was not the only centre of learning in the

Hellenistic Greek empire. Mention should also be made of
Apollonius of Perga (a city in modern-day southern Turkey)
whose late 3rd Century BCE work on geometry (and, in
particular, on conics and conic sections) was very influential
on later European mathematicians. It was Apollonius who
gave the ellipse, the parabola, and the hyperbola the names
by which we know them, and showed how they could be
derived from different sections through a cone.
 There are three distinct families of conic sections: the ellipse
(including the circle), the parabola (with one branch), and the
hyperbola (with two branches)

– Conic Section
Conic section, also called conic, in geometry, any 
curve produced by the intersection of a plane and a
right circular cone. Depending on the angle of the plane
relative to the cone, the intersection is a circle, an 
ellipse, a hyperbola, or a parabola. Special (degenerate)
cases of intersection occur when the plane passes
through only the apex (producing a single point) or
through the apex and another point on the cone
(producing one straight line or two intersecting straight
lines). 
 Circle Formula

Standard Form:
Ellipse
Parabola
Hyperbola
– By the time of the great Alexandrian astronomer Ptolemy in the 2nd
Century CE, however, Greek mastery of numerical procedures had
progressed to the point where Ptolemy was able to include in his
“Almagest” a table of trigonometric chords in a circle for steps of ¼°
which (although expressed sexagesimally in the Babylonian style) is
accurate to about five decimal places. By the middle of the 1st Century
BCE and thereafter, however, the Romans had tightened their grip on the
old Greek empire. The Romans had no use for pure mathematics, only
for its practical applications, and the Christian regime that followed it
even less so.
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