Volume, Brickage and Capacity in Old Babylonian Mathematical Texts from Southern Mesopotamia

Abstract

This chapter analyses different ways of quantifying tri-dimensional entities in Old Babylonian mathematical cuneiform texts. In administrative documents, the metrology adopted by scribes depended on the nature of the things being quantified. In mathematical texts too, one finds different ways of quantifying tri-dimensional entities, but these different approaches to spatial extension are not completely independent from each other as they are in administrative texts. Some mathematical texts exhibit conversions between capacity, volume and brickage metrologies. It is the case of a set of eight ‘catalogue texts’ preserved at Yale University, which contain lists of statements of problems carefully organized according to thematic criteria, and some other related texts. This set of texts provides an interesting view of the mathematical approach to spatial problems attested in a southern city, and may reflect a specific mathematical culture for quantifying spatial entities (The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007–2013)/ERC Grant Agreement No. 269804.).