Cultures of Computation and Quantification in the Ancient World Numbers, Measurements, and Operations in Documents from Mesopotamia, China and South Asia

This book sheds light on the variety of mathematical cultures in general. To do so, it concentrates on cultures of computation and quantification in the ancient world, mainly in ancient China, South Asia, and the Ancient Near East and offers case studies focused on numbers, quantities, and operation...

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Bibliographic Details
Other Authors: Chemla, Karine (Editor), Keller, Agathe (Editor), Proust, Christine (Editor)
Format: eBook
Language:English
Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 2022, 2022
Edition:1st ed. 2022
Series:Why the Sciences of the Ancient World Matter
Subjects:
Online Access:
Collection: Springer eBooks 2005- - Collection details see MPG.ReNa
Table of Contents:
  • Chapter 1. Cultures of computation and quantification in the ancient world: An introduction (Karine Chemla, in dialogue with Agathe Keller and Christine Proust)
  • Part 1: Shaping quantities and relating them to numbers
  • Chapter 2. Carrying bricks and bundling reed in theory and practice (Wolfgang Heimpel)
  • Chapter 3. Measuring grain in early Bronze Age Mesopotamia: Form, use, and control of the bariga container in the Twenty-First Century BCE (Walther Sallaberger)
  • Chapter 4. Volume, brickage and capacity in old Babylonian mathematical texts from Southern Mesopotamia (Christine Proust)
  • Part 2: Interpreting numbers and quantities in texts
  • Place value notations in the Ur III period: Marginal numbers in administrative texts (Ouyang Xiaoli and Christine Proust)
  • Chapter 6. The Nazbalum in old Babylonian Mesopotamia (Robert Middeke-Conlin)
  • Part 3. Working with operations and algorithms
  • Chapter 7. Computing tools and representations of arithmetic (Baptiste Mélès)
  • Chapter 8. Working on and with division in early China, Third Century BCE—Seventh Century CE (Karine Chemla)
  • Chapter 9. Multiplying integers: On the diverse practices of medieval Sanskrit authors (Agathe Keller and Catherine Morice-Singh)
  • Part 4. Different cultures of computation and quantification
  • Chapter 10. Another culture of computation from 7th century China (Zhu Yiwen)
  • Chapter 11. The characteristics of mathematical methods in the Wu Cao Suanjing and its social background (Zou Dahai and Chen Wei)
  • Chapter 12. Weighing units and weights in the context of trade between upper Mesopotamia and Anatolia (Nineteenth and Eighteenth Centuries BCE) (Cécile Michel)
  • Chapter 13. Quantification and computation in the mathematical texts of old Babylonian Diyala (Carlos Gonçalves)
  • Index.