Method and style in Archimedes' \textit{Quadrature of the parabola} (Q6896051)

One of Archimedes' well-known result is the \textit{Quadrature of the parabola}, namely that the area of any segment of a parabola is four-thirds of the triangle with the same base and equal height. Archimedes proves this statement twice. On the one hand by using a mechanical method consisting of notionally suspending a parabolic segment and other figures in equilibrium against a set of imaginary weights and on the other hand by traditional geometric proof. The main point that the present article observes and analyses are the distinct stylistic registers that appear in the two main sections of Archimedes' \textit{Quadrature of the parabola}. The correspondence between prose register and mathematical method indicates that in the mechanical propositions of the first section of \textit{Quadrature of the parabola}, as well as in several of his other treatises, Archimedes was purposefully deploying a unique style as a kind of rhetorical branding for his most innovative work. The author proposes that Archimedes is using this style to place his mechanical method into its own genre, related to but distinct from that of established geometry, and to furnish himself with rhetorical tools to persuade an audience resistant to unorthodox methods.