Jim Alison Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> In "Mathematics in the Time of the Pharoahs",
> Gillings gives problem #38 as follows:
>
> 3 1/7 times the container is required to fill the
> hekat measure. What is the volume of the
> container? To find the volume of the container,
> the scribe has to divide one by 3 1/7.
>
> In other words the ratio between one hekat and the
> volume of the container is pi:1 and the ratio
> between the container and one hekat is 1:pi.

No, you haven't found pi. What you've found is an instance of a fraction - 3 1/7 - that you identify as pi, i.e., the ratio between the diameter and circumference of a circle. You go on to claim that:

Quote

This is a clear expression of 22/7 and 7/22, contrary to the suggestion that there are no textual references to the 3 1/7 ratio that is found in the great pyramid and elsewhere in the art and architecture of ancient Egypt.

This, I'm afraid, is a glaring example of a straw man argument. What's been said on innumerable threads is that there is nothing to suggest that the AEs actually recognised that the fraction 3 1/7 or 22/7 was also the ratio of the relationship between a circle's diameter and circumference. To them, it was just a fraction.

Hermione
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