Jakob Köbel's surveying: elementary errors or strategic simplifications? (Q2326248)

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Jakob Köbel's surveying: elementary errors or strategic simplifications?
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    Jakob Köbel's surveying: elementary errors or strategic simplifications? (English)
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    7 October 2019
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    Jakob Köbel (ca. 1460--1533) produced in 1522 a book devoted to geometrical field measurement techniques. Many of the ``rules'' given would have resulted in inaccurate results, such as giving the area of an equilateral triangle in effect as half the product of two of its sides. The work appeared essentially unchanged in a number of further editions. Were these inaccuracies due to ignorance or were they intentionally a simplification suitable for users of practical mathematics? Answering this leads to addressing further questions, such as what might the author had been expected to know of only recently propagated works of Euclid? What was the tradition of ``practical mathematics'' at the time? All of this is against the background of the spread of the new technology of printing. The definitive answer may not be known, but the investigation detailed here, illustrated with woodcuts from the edition, provides a picture of an aspect of mathematical culture of the time.
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    Euclidean geometry
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    applied geometry
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    history of geometry
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    surveying
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    printing
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