Buy new:
$14.95
FREE delivery Saturday, May 18 on orders shipped by Amazon over $35
Ships from: Amazon.com
Sold by: Amazon.com
$14.95
Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns
FREE delivery Saturday, May 18 on orders shipped by Amazon over $35
Or fastest delivery Thursday, May 16. Order within 14 hrs 4 mins
Only 11 left in stock (more on the way).
$$14.95 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details
Price
Subtotal
$$14.95
Subtotal
Initial payment breakdown
Shipping cost, delivery date, and order total (including tax) shown at checkout.
Ships from
Amazon.com
Ships from
Amazon.com
Sold by
Amazon.com
Sold by
Amazon.com
Returns
30-day easy returns
30-day easy returns
This item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt.
Read full return policy
Returns
30-day easy returns
This item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt.
Read full return policy
Payment
Secure transaction
Your transaction is secure
We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more
Payment
Secure transaction
We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more
$13.45
Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns
FREE delivery Monday, May 20 on orders shipped by Amazon over $35
Or fastest delivery Thursday, May 16. Order within 14 hrs 4 mins
Only 1 left in stock - order soon.
$$14.95 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details
Price
Subtotal
$$14.95
Subtotal
Initial payment breakdown
Shipping cost, delivery date, and order total (including tax) shown at checkout.
Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.
Kindle app logo image

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

QR code to download the Kindle App

Follow the author

O. Neugebauer
+ Follow
More books from this author
Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.

The Exact Sciences in Antiquity 2nd ed. Edition

by O. Neugebauer (Author)
4.8 4.8 out of 5 stars 31 ratings
See all formats and editions
{"desktop_buybox_group_1":[{"displayPrice":"$14.95","priceAmount":14.95,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"14","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"95","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"cjKeXFTASjM7LKA%2B2niHZTS9TXvcfFZYC4wWtcAHMx%2BzKGUizyN3lhGx7PWFTtq22mj15VI7%2B%2FOYyZ%2Bn%2FjV3zK%2BEpghVGhC1jblj9fCKEz26lvsH0kYl%2FDswhG%2FlWq4aaR24tQi6QOA%3D","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":0}, {"displayPrice":"$13.45","priceAmount":13.45,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"13","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"45","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"cjKeXFTASjM7LKA%2B2niHZTS9TXvcfFZYBMbHHQA3ecUjmMzqUroXvh7Y5B%2FzKJ62UrX7nrslGIspAxv6ilpFBnGwEoCVV87fGk4aabr4AI%2BffQLTDnz2OjvyPeFZOmeZacRBPZXOzPK%2BkJMrqWSz4eIGPR4LQ%2B9iVkaWbPfv9sDdnk8JEBM%2FufRkBUkLiPZg","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"USED","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":1}]}

Purchase options and add-ons

Based on a series of lectures delivered at Cornell University in the fall of 1949, and since revised, this is the standard non-technical coverage of Egyptian and Babylonian mathematics and astronomy, and their transmission to the Hellenistic world. Entirely modern in its data and conclusions, it reveals the surprising sophistication of certain areas of early science, particularly Babylonian mathematics.
After a discussion of the number systems used in the ancient Near East (contrasting the Egyptian method of additive computations with unit fractions and Babylonian place values), Dr. Neugebauer covers Babylonian tables for numerical computation, approximations of the square root of 2 (with implications that the Pythagorean Theorem was known more than a thousand years before Pythagoras), Pythagorean numbers, quadratic equations with two unknowns, special cases of logarithms and various other algebraic and geometric cases. Babylonian strength in algebraic and numerical work reveals a level of mathematical development in many aspects comparable to the mathematics of the early Renaissance in Europe. This is in contrast to the relatively primitive Egyptian mathematics. In the realm of astronomy, too, Dr. Neugebauer describes an unexpected sophistication, which is interpreted less as the result of millennia of observations (as used to be the interpretation) than as a competent mathematical apparatus. The transmission of this early science and its further development in Hellenistic times is also described. An Appendix discusses certain aspects of Greek astronomy and the indebtedness of the Copernican system to Ptolemaic and Islamic methods.
Dr. Neugebauer has long enjoyed an international reputation as one of the foremost workers in the area of premodern science. Many of his discoveries have revolutionized earlier understandings. In this volume he presents a non-technical survey, with much material unique on this level, which can be read with great profit by all interested in the history of science or history of culture.

Read more Read less
Previous page
  1. ISBN-10
    0486223329
  2. ISBN-13
    978-0486223322
  3. Edition
    2nd ed.
  4. Publisher
    Dover Publications
  5. Publication date
    June 1, 1969
  6. Language
    English
  7. Dimensions
    5.42 x 0.55 x 8.46 inches
  8. Print length
    288 pages
  9. See all details
Next page
Amazon First Reads | Editors' picks at exclusive prices

Frequently bought together

The Exact Sciences in Antiquity
$14.95
Get it as soon as Saturday, May 18
Only 11 left in stock (more on the way).
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
+
Skywatchers : A Revised and Updated Version of Skywatchers of Ancient Mexico
$41.51
Get it as soon as Tuesday, May 21
Only 1 left in stock - order soon.
Sold by EXISTENCE and ships from Amazon Fulfillment.
+
A Brief Introduction to Astronomy in the Middle East
$11.95
Get it as soon as Saturday, May 18
Only 9 left in stock (more on the way).
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
Total price:
To see our price, add these items to your cart.
Details
Added to Cart
Some of these items ship sooner than the others.
Show details Hide details
Choose items to buy together.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Otto Neugebauer: Exacting History
Neugebauer's The Exact Sciences in Antiquity became an instant unique classic of scientific literature when first published in 1951 in the United States and in Copenhagen where he had lived and worked for some years after having been forced out of Germany because of his opposition to National Socialism. At the start of World War II, Otto Neugebauer (1899–1990) left Europe for Brown University where he founded the History of Mathematics Department. Years later a colleague at Brown recalled Neugebauer's eloquent summary of the dark years in Germany: "If you never heard the sound of Nazi boots below you in the street, you cannot understand the history of the period."

In the 1980s he moved to the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He wrote several books and many articles in addition to The Exact Sciences in Antiquity. His monumental three-volume History of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy (1975) is the definitive work on the subject. Dover reprinted The Exact Sciences in Antiquity in 1969.

Critical Acclaim for Otto Neugebauer:
"Otto Neugebauer was the most original and productive scholar of the history of the exact sciences, perhaps of the history of science, of our age. He began as a mathematician, turned first to Egyptian and Babylonian mathematics, and then took up the history of mathematical astronomy, to which he afterward devoted the greatest part of his attention. In a career of sixty-five years, he to a great extent created our understanding of mathematical astronomy from Babylon and Egypt, through Greco-Roman antiquity, to India, Islam, and Europe of the Middle Ages and Renaissance. Through his colleagues, students, and many readers, his influence on the study of the history of the exact sciences remains profound, even definitive." ― N. M. Swerdlow

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Dover Publications; 2nd ed. edition (June 1, 1969)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 288 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0486223329
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0486223322
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.7 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.42 x 0.55 x 8.46 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.8 4.8 out of 5 stars 31 ratings

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.
O. Neugebauer

O. Neugebauer

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

Customer reviews

4.8 out of 5 stars
4.8 out of 5
31 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Denis J. EVANS
5.0 out of 5 stars Without peer - as far as I am aware
Reviewed in the United States on February 18, 2023
Verified Purchase
Goes through the gamut of mathematical developments throughout antiquity: Egyptian, Sumerian, Babylonian, Greek and Roman. As I said without peer. If you are interested in the ancient history of mathematics, this is the book.
Helpful
 Report
Kyle B.
5.0 out of 5 stars Good Explanations and Great Overview
Reviewed in the United States on November 4, 2017
Verified Purchase
Neugebauer explains how ancient math and astronomy worked. This is done very well, although I'd argue that he doesn't always make it very clear what he's talking about if you don't already know (his treatment of the Almagest and Ptolemy's map projections take a lot of definitions for granted). In order to understand the explanations of many of the steps, you will have to reread them many times and stare at the figures (just like you have to for any math/physics books with derivations that aren't trivial). Still, the explanations are there, and Neugebauer in the main of the text gives good information about the history of science, his opinions, and I thought his Babylonian math explanations were much clearer than the geometric ones.

Overall, I think it is definitely worth reading just to get a sense of the achievements of ancient cultures, and to know what ancient math and astronomy consisted of.
One person found this helpful
Helpful
 Report
Matt N
5.0 out of 5 stars A trip back in time to the beginning of math and science
Reviewed in the United States on January 19, 2018
Verified Purchase
Other reviews are correct when they describe this book as the classic textbook for how ancient cultures approached mathematics and scientific calculations. The examples are well explained and illustrative of the mindset of each culture at the time. It's fascinating seeing "normal" calculations like trigononetry written in cuneiform or ancient Egyptian. As a data analyst I approached this book from the perspective of how numbers are stored and how the arrangement / structure affects the mathematical thought / steps necessary to solve a problem using them. The only thing to be aware of is that the prose is very dry and a little outdated, but if you're curious enough to buy a book about ancient math, you are probably accustomed to it.
2 people found this helpful
Helpful
 Report
Darrin D. Vernier
5.0 out of 5 stars Extremely well researched and accurate
Reviewed in the United States on June 20, 2013
Verified Purchase
Rather than the endless tomes containing nothing but what individuals think the ancients did this one actually shows pictures of some of the source tablets and mathematical tables the concepts in the book were translated from. The sources are direct, well researched, well documented, and extremely reliable. I first bought this book a couple of decades ago but discovering it missing from my library after a move I still treasured it enough to purchase it again. For someone in search of a time when the mathematics of music, time, and space were one it is most rewarding and worthwhile.
2 people found this helpful
Helpful
 Report
Jerry
5.0 out of 5 stars Satisfied
Reviewed in the United States on December 1, 2020
Verified Purchase
Very satisfied with this purchase.
Helpful
 Report
Robert Davis
3.0 out of 5 stars lacks photos of source documents
Reviewed in the United States on October 17, 2020
Verified Purchase
This was a second edition hardback, a Barnes and Noble copy. I was disappointed that it did not include photos of the source document tablets which the original book apparently had.
Helpful
 Report
FOXIMUS
5.0 out of 5 stars A very unique and interested book
Reviewed in the United States on January 4, 2014
Verified Purchase
This book is incredible! It is really dense with information that I don't quite understand, but the history presented by the author is intriguing nonetheless. I honestly don't understand anything besides base 10 maths :) Definitely buy this book...and then read it.
Helpful
 Report
Pierre
5.0 out of 5 stars Informative
Reviewed in the United States on April 1, 2017
Verified Purchase
An excellent book about the history and the extent of advancement of mathematics, astronomy, and physics in Antiquity.
Helpful
 Report

Top reviews from other countries

Translate all reviews to English
Cliente Amazon
5.0 out of 5 stars Stupendo
Reviewed in Italy on June 22, 2022
Verified Purchase
Per chi capisce bene l'inglese ottima lettura, altrimenti meglio prendere l'edizione in italiano. L'autore è uno dei maggiori studiosi sull'argomento.
Report
paloma ortiz
5.0 out of 5 stars Un clásico
Reviewed in Spain on March 17, 2014
Verified Purchase
Aunque publicado hace ya muchos años, mantiene su interés por estar basado en datos obtenidos personalmente por el autor en los textos que sirven de fuente al estudio.
Report