History
See also: History of trigonometrySpherical triangles were studied by early Greek mathematicians such as Menelaus of Alexandria, who wrote a book on spherical triangles called Sphaerica and developed Menelaus' theorem. E. S. Kennedy, however, points out that while it was possible in ancient mathematics to compute the magnitudes of a spherical figure, in principle, by use of the table of chords and Menelaus' theorem, the application of the theorem to spherical problems was very difficult in practice.
Tycho Brahe remarks that the nature of understanding spherical triangles is so divine and elevated that it is not appropriate to extend its mysteries to everyone. (Diuinior et excellentior sit Triangulorum sphæricorum cognitio, quam fas sit eius mysteria omnibus propalare.)
Read more about this topic: Spherical Trigonometry
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“It’s nice to be a part of history but people should get it right. I may not be perfect, but I’m bloody close.”
—John Lydon (formerly Johnny Rotten)
“The history of all Magazines shows plainly that those which have attained celebrity were indebted for it to articles similar in natureto Berenice—although, I grant you, far superior in style and execution. I say similar in nature. You ask me in what does this nature consist? In the ludicrous heightened into the grotesque: the fearful coloured into the horrible: the witty exaggerated into the burlesque: the singular wrought out into the strange and mystical.”
—Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849)
“The history of American politics is littered with bodies of people who took so pure a position that they had no clout at all.”
—Ben C. Bradlee (b. 1921)