The language of mathematics: the case of cuneiform texts

Lecture by Carlos Gonçalves (Paris IAS fellow)

Presentation

Numbers, measurements and calculations were extremely common in the cuneiform culture. Besides their presence in the so-called strictly mathematical texts, numbers, measurements and calculations were also constitutive of texts of loan contracts, real state transactions and tribute collection, to mention only these examples. In this talk, I will present some aspects of the mathematical language that characterise this rich corpus.