According to Jacques Sesiano in "An Introduction to the History of Algebra" (AMS, 2009), this problem is based on a Babylonian clay tablet circa 1800 B.C. (VAT 8389, Museum of the Ancient Near East).

A Brief History of the Letter ‘X,’ From Algebra to X-Mas to Elon Musk A math historian explores how “x” came to stand in for an unknown quantity ...

National 4; Algebraic skills History of Algebra. An equation is a formula containing one or more variables. Types include: straight line, algebraic, simultaneous and equations that require you to ...

Algebra today is a branch of math in which abstract symbols are manipulated, using arithmetic, to solve different kinds of equations. But many ancient societies had well-developed mathematical ...

Unknown Quantity: A Real and Imaginary History of Algebra John Derbyshire, . . Joseph Henry, $27.95 (374pp) ISBN 978-0-309-09657-7 ...

At this point, “algebra” had been around for hundreds of years, but al-Khwārizmī was the first to write a definitive book on it. His work was meant to be a practical teaching tool.

A mathematician has uncovered a way of answering some of algebra's oldest problems. University of New South Wales Honorary Professor Norman Wildberger, has revealed a potentially game-changing ...

Even if the origins of x in algebra are uncertain, there are some instances in which historians do know why x is used. The X in Xmas as an abbreviation for Christmas definitely does come from the ...

THIS is the second volume of the three in which ooo the authors are writing the history of Hindu mathematics. The first contained Part 1, dealing with numeral notation and arithmetic, which was ...