History of Math Links

General Sites

The most comprehensive History of Math site on the web, highly recommended.


A nice website, with an excellent listing of printed sources.

An excellent site, with in-depth discussion of many topics.

Mesopotamian Math

A nice overview of Mesopotamian mathematics, starting with the pre-historic.
The most interesting Mesopotamian mathematical tablet.  See for yourself: Plimpton 322

A great collection of images of cuneiform tablets.  Click on the images and see if you can read the numbers!

Egyptian Math

A very detailed discussion of Egyptian fractions, including a calculator.
An argument about how much we really know about ancient Egyptian mathematics.

Some cool animations of Egyptian Geometry.

Greek Math

The complete text of Euclid's Elements with commentary and JAVA applets to explain the proofs.  Highly recommended.
One of the most beautiful books ever published is Oliver Byrne's 1847 edition of the Elements.  Instead of letters to denote geometric figures (for instance, triangle ABC) the book uses colors. This very rare book is available online.
Images of some classical Greek sources.  Note that the oldest date from only the 9th Century AD.

Hypatia, the first female mathematician.
"Hypatia and Her Mathematics"  from the American Mathematical Monthly on JSTOR.


The History of Astrology/Astronomy.

Quipu, an Incan tally device using color-coded thred.