Wednesday, September 27, 2023

Ancient Egyptian mathematics: Numeration

 What differences do you notice between ancient Mesopotamian/ Babylonian numeration and ancient Egyptian numeration systems?

Its also similar to the mesopotamian method of counting, in the sense that they count objects. For example, 9 would be 9 sticks.However, it is clear that the biggest difference is that the Babylonian system uses base 60 while the Egyptian method uses base 10, like we use today. Another difference is that the Egyptian method does the ones first, then increases in powers of base 10, while on the other hand, the Babylonian system does its highest power/"digit" first and then decreases accordingly.

(And if you are familiar with Roman numerals -- which we will visit later -- what similarities and differences do you notice?)

They are very similar in the sense that they both use base 10 and counts objects. However, I believe that the roman numeral system is more modern, and thus has a sign for 5, allowing numbers to more condensed (instead of writing 9 sticks). They are different in the order. Egyptian numeration starts with the ones digit on the left and goes up powers of 10, while Roman numerals are the other way around.

What affordances and constraints do you notice for the Egyptian system? For the Babylonian system?

For both systems, it is a hassle to write large numbers. Imagine writing 99999. The symbols would compile and would take up a large amount of space. In addition, there is no symbol for 0, as the number 0 has been discovered by India. As we know, the number 0 however is a very important one, so this sets limitations to the mathematics they can do. For the Egyptian method in particular, I am also unsure how they do fractions. For the Babylonian system, fractions are certainly easier, but with base 60, numbers like 59 and 119 might be a hassle to write. 

1 comment:

  1. Hi Nathaniel, nice discussion, here. Curious to know which one you found easier to take up.

    ReplyDelete

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