History of mathematics – the seventeenth century

Maciej Kruszewski 2c

The origins of mathematics

People are accompanied by mathematics from the beginning. First simple calculations were used by prehistoric hunters, women providing the date of

menstruation and war leaders estimating numbers of troops. The first mathematical text was “Plimpton 322'' in

Babylonia about 1800 BC containing calculations in accordance with the Pythagorean Theorem

The seventeenth century

The turning point in development of geometry was publication of work by Descartes ,,Lá géométrie’’, what

started development of analytic geometry, part of geometry involved in the study of geometric figures and

algebraic calculation methods

Origin of calculus initiated differential geometry. It was started by a Swiss mathematician and physicist Leonhard Euler, and developed widely by German mathematician

and physicist Carl Friedrich Gauss. Differential geometry is dealing with curves, surfaces and its dimensions

It was created at the end of the seventeenth century. It describes methods of presenting spatial figures on a

plane.

Descriptive geometry

Desargues Theorem In the seventeenth century, Gerard Desargues created

and proved one of the first theorems of projective geometry, which is involved with figures properties.

Theorem:“When two triangles are in perspective, the points where

the corresponding sides meet are collinear

THE END