Book contents
- Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient World
- Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient World
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Commentators at Work
- 2 Philosophical Commentaries on Mathematical Texts
- 3 Characterizing a Sanskrit Mathematical Commentary
- 4 Calling out Zheng Xuan (127–200 CE) at the Crossroads of Ritual, Mathematics, Sport, and Classical Commentary
- Comparing Commentaries
- Index of Proper Names
- Index of Subjects
- Index of Titles of Cited Texts
- References
3 - Characterizing a Sanskrit Mathematical Commentary
An Exploration of Pṛthūdaka’s Vāsanābhāṣya on Progressions
from Commentators at Work
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 June 2022
Book contents
- Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient World
- Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient World
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Commentators at Work
- 2 Philosophical Commentaries on Mathematical Texts
- 3 Characterizing a Sanskrit Mathematical Commentary
- 4 Calling out Zheng Xuan (127–200 CE) at the Crossroads of Ritual, Mathematics, Sport, and Classical Commentary
- Comparing Commentaries
- Index of Proper Names
- Index of Subjects
- Index of Titles of Cited Texts
- References
Summary
Exploring what could have been the particularity of Sanskrit mathematical commentaries in the larger landscape of the scholarly commentaries of South Asia, this chapter explores how Prthūdaka (ca. 850) carries out ‘explanations’ on two mathematical verses of Brahmagupta's Theoretical Astronomical Treatise of the True Brahma [School] (Brahmasphuṭasiddhānta-628) concerning progressions. As the commentator explores in many different ways the scope of the rule, a multiplicity of meanings is drawn out, among which one may find the interpretation of a progression as a pile of areas of rectangles within a ‘proof’, or the reading of one procedure as being an algebraical consequence of a previous one. It is within examples and their variations that such mathematical explorations are made, and these may very well be the textual particularity of mathematical commentaries in South Asia.
Keywords
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient WorldA Global Perspective, pp. 96 - 140Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022
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