Photo by: Creative Commons Hipparchus, a famous Greek mathematician and astronomer, was born in 190 BC in what is now Turkey. He may not be as famous today as Euclid, Pythagoras and other Greek luminaries, but during his time, he was greatly renowned. His mathematical achievements were considered exceptional by his contemporaries and many future generations. Simply put, he was a legend, and his face adorned coins that were in circulation for many decades in that period.

Thales lived around 580 BC in Miletus, Greece. Like many prominent Greek scholars, he was adept in not just one but many fields of knowledge. Thales was an accomplished mathematician, philosopher and physicist. In fact, he is often referred to as the “Father of Physics,” and he was one of the “Seven Sages,” Greece’s seven most acclaimed philosophers. Thales was also active in politics and education. But his main profession when he was alive was as an engineer. One of [...]

Eratosthenes was a prominent Greek mathematician, astronomer and geographer who lived between 276 BC and 194 BC. He was born in what is now Libya, to parents who were probably Chaldean. Eratosthenes is famous for many things, including a mapping method that used latitudes and longitudes, and his accurate computation of the circumference of earth. To compute for the circumference of the earth, Eratosthenes used the principles of trigonometry and available data on the altitude of the sun in two [...]