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Euclid's Elements: "The Founding Document of Mathematics"

323 to 283 BCE
19th-century statue of Euclid by Joseph Durham in the Oxford University Museum of Natural History.

19th-century statue of Euclid by Joseph Durham in the Oxford University Museum of Natural History. The way that Euclid is holding the papyrus roll is historically accurate. The stubby cylinder in his right hand is probably a stylus which had to be sculpted thicker than it would have been in order to be rendered in stone.

Between 323 and 283 BCE mathematician Euclid of Alexandria, a teacher at the Alexandrian Library under the reign of Ptolemy I, wrote the Elements, in which he summarized and codified the preceding two centuries of mathematical research. Considered the founding document of mathematics, the Elements was the standard textbook for mathematical education in the ancient world, in the Islamic world, and in Europe through the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and until almost the present time. "The system of thought presented by the Elements, in which knowledge was distilled in the form of theorems and then given a written proof, inspired fields as diverse as law and physics. Indeed, Newton’s Principia, which marked the beginning of modern physics, took Euclid’s work as its intellectual and stylistic model.”

♦ For numerous related entries in this database about the transmission and publication of Euclid, and its influence, please search under Euclid in the keyword search.

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