Mathematical Digest
Short Summaries of Articles about Mathematics
in the Popular Press "Math Homework 4,000 Years Ago," by Eric Powell. Discover, May 2001. Eleanor Robson, an expert in Sumerian writing at Oxford University, believes that the Plimpton 322 cryptic tablet is the world's oldest known set of a teacher's class notes. Previous researchers have speculated that the inscribed tablet, dated around 1800 B.C., was a trigonometry table or astronomical calculations. --- Annette Emerson |
