The Bakhshali manuscript
The Bakhshali manuscript is an ancient mathematical treatise that was found in 1881 in the village of Bakhshali, approximately 80 kilometers northeast of Peshawar (then in India, now in Pakistan). Among the topics covered in this document, at least in the fragments that have been recovered, are solutions of systems of linear equations, indeterminate (Diophantine) equations of the second degree, arithmetic progressions of various types, and rational approximations of square roots (more on this below).
The manuscript features an extensive usage of decimal arithmetic — the same full-fledged positional decimal arithmetic with zero system that we
Continue reading Origin of decimal arithmetic with zero pushed back to 3rd century CE