All the sines of a new father of triangles

There is much apprehension these days about calculated moves to alter history, but the re-examination of a cuneiform tablet from Mesopotamia now indicates that a reassessment of the history of mathematics may also be on the cards.

The inscriptions on a 3,800-year-old Babylonian clay tablet from the time of the famed ruler Hammurabi, now named Plimpton 322 — discovered by a diplomat-excavator who was said to be the inspiration for Indiana Jones — apparently allows accurate trigonometric calculations using exact ratios of the lengths of the sides of right-angled triangles (instead of the sines, cosines and tangents commonly taught in schools now) with their unique base 60 form of mathematics.

Many have speculated that the claims of the 5th-century BC Greek mathematician Pythagoras being the first to deduce facts about right-angled triangles just did not add up. Some believe later commentaries indicate it was the collaborative work of his followers, the Pythagoreans.

Ancient Indian and Chinese mathematicians who also independently arrived at the same conclusions make up the other points of this triangular contest. Now that the timeline has jumped back by a millennium to some unknown Babylonian mathematician(s) and threatens to snatch the glory from all the other three, trigonometry’s history may have to be recalibrated.