Menelaus

Menelaus of Alexandria

Born: about 70 in (possibly) Alexandria, Egypt
Died: about 130

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Of Menelaus's many books only Sphaerica has survived. It deals with spherical triangles and their application to astronomy. He was the first to write down the definition of a spherical triangle. In Book I of Sphaerica he set up the basis for treating spherical triangles as Euclid treated plane triangles. He initiated the study of arcs of great circles on the sphere. Book 2 applies spherical trigonometry to astronomy. Book 3 deals with spherical trigonometry and includes Menelaus Theorem.

References elsewhere in this archive:

Show me Menelaus's theorem

References:

  1. Dictionary of Scientific Biography
  2. Biography in Encyclopaedia Britannica
  3. T L Heath, A History of Greek Mathematics II (Oxford, 1921), 260-273.
  4. M Krause, De Sphärik von Menelaos aus Alexandrien, Abhandlungen der Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen 17 (1936). 
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JOC/EFR February 1996