The Egyptian numeration is one of the oldest in the world. It was used for mathematics, it was used to perform fairly complex calculations, for example, the measurement of time, land areas, taxes or the flood levels of the Nile.
2- History of Egyptian numeration
In Ancient Egypt, at the time of the pharaohs, scribes were the only ones to master the noble art of writing. They wrote on stones by carving the symbols with picks and hammers. They also wrote the more official documents on the papyri with reeds dipped in ink.
It is estimated that the appearance of the first Egyptian numeration system dates back to 2700 BC. It was developed on decimal bases.
With this system, mathematics developed very rapidly in Egypt. The Rhind Papyrus, known to be one of the first mathematics textbooks, asks questions about the geometry of triangles. The parts of this papyrus that still exist show how Egyptian architects calculated the proportions of pyramids and other structures.
3-The Mathematics aspect
Egyptian numeration was based on a base 10 numbering system, their system was called additive type, it is based on additions.
The Egyptian scribes of the time of the Pharaohs (3000 years ago BC) used a hieroglyph to designate each of the numbers in the power of 10. For example 1; 10; 100;10,000; 100,000 and 1,000,000. We can thus write numbers up to 999. 999. 999.
There were two writing systems , the hieroglyphic system used for monuments and stones (in this system each symbol represents an object) and the hieratic system (simplification of hieroglyphs) used on papyri (that of Rhind mentioned in the preamble). For operations, the Egyptians used tables of square roots of powers included. They knew how to extract square and cubic roots, but also how to solve first or second degree equations with one unknown.
Thanks to this ingenious system of cryptography, it is estimated that the Egyptians are at the origin of the geometry, indeed during the floods of the Nile, the quantity surveyors used the cord of 13 knots to draw right angles and thus determined the surfaces of the land. .
Egyptian Numbering is an ancient and eminently complex cryptographic system that serves an enormous number of functions. Its handling is a respected art, even downright admired. It is common for certain puzzles to be transcribed into this code . We hope that with this article you can succeed in your task…