Another look at the nb.t in the Moscow Mathematical Papyrus
Another look at the nb.t in the Moscow Mathematical Papyrus

Summary/Abstract: This paper makes a case that the nb.t or “basket” whose surface area is calculated in Problem 10 of the Moscow Mathematical Papyrus is a segment of a circle whose two given dimensions – base of 9 and height of 4½ – identify it as a semicircular segment. The area is found by configuring the two given dimensions as the sides of a rectangle and then reducing the long side of the rectangle by two successive reductions of    : 9 – = 8, and 8 – =7   , the product of 7   and 4½ yielding the area of the figure, 32. The shape of the nb.t has also been construed by other scholars as a hemisphere and as the lateral area of a semicylinder, with plausible- -sounding arguments mustered in favor of those interpretations. Those interpretations, however, depend upon operations not otherwise attested in the Middle Egyptian mathematical papyri. The interpretation put forth here is that the nb.t belongs to a family of two -dimensional plane figures having a flat base called a tp r, this dimension shortened by a figure -specific algorithm and multiplied together with a given second dimension to give the area of the figure.

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