Biography of archimedes and timeline
Archimedes (c.287 - c.212 BC)
Engraving of Archimedes ©Archimedes was a Greek mathematician, philosopher and inventor who wrote important works on geometry, arithmetic and mechanics.
Archimedes was born in Syracuse on the eastern coast of Sicily and educated in Alexandria in Egypt. He then returned to Syracuse, where he spent most of the rest of his life, devoting his time to research and experimentation in many fields.
In mechanics he defined the principle of the lever and is credited with inventing the compound pulley and the hydraulic screw for raising water from a lower to higher level. He is most famous for discovering the law of hydrostatics, sometimes known as 'Archimedes' principle', stating that a body immersed in fluid loses weight equal to the weight of the amount of fluid it displaces. Archimedes is supposed to have made this discovery when stepping into his bath, causing him to exclaim 'Eureka!'
During the Roman conquest of Sicily in 214 BC Archimedes worked for the state, and several of his mechanical devices were employed in the defence of Syracuse. Among the war machines attributed to him are the catapult and - perhaps legendary - a mirror system for focusing the sun's rays on the invaders' boats and igniting them. After Syracuse was captured, Archimedes was killed by a Roman soldier. It is said that he was so absorbed in his calculations he told his killer not to disturb him.
The Archimedes Palimpsest
Archimedes was born in the city of Syracuse on the island of Sicily in 287 BC. He was the son of an astronomer and mathematician named Phidias. Aside from that, very little is known about the early life of Archimedes or his family. Some maintain that he belonged to the nobility of Syracuse, and that his family was in some way related to that of Hiero II, King of Syracuse.
In the third century BC, Syracuse was a hub of commerce, art and science. As a youth in Syracuse Archimedes developed his natural curiosity and penchant for problem solving. When he had learned as much as he could from his teachers, Archimedes traveled to Egypt in order to study in Alexandria. Founded by Alexander the Great in 331 BC, Alexandria had, by Archimedes' time, earned a reputation for great learning and scholarship.
Euclid was one of the most well-known scholars who lived in Alexandria prior to Archimedes' arrival in the city. Euclid was a renowned mathematician, perhaps best remembered for collecting all of the existent Greek geometrical treatises and assembling them in a logical and systematic order in his book, “The Elements.” This compilation was fundamental to the study of geometry for over 2,000 years, and undoubtedly influenced the work of Archimedes.
After his studies in Alexandria, Archimedes returned to Syracuse and pursued a life of thought and invention. Many apocryphal legends record how Archimedes endeared himself to King Hiero II, discovering solutions to problems that vexed the king.
Archimedes' Screw
One such story recounts how a perplexed King Hiero was unable to empty rainwater from the hull of one of his ships. The King called upon Archimedes for assistance. Archimedes' solution was to create a machine consisting of a hollow tube containing a spiral that could be turned by a handle at one end. When the lower end of the tube was placed into the hull and the handle turned, water was carried up the tube and out of the boa Archimedes is one of the most famous scientists of the ancient world. The details of his personal life are not well known, but his genius was recognized and highly regarded during his life by both friends and foes. He made startlingly brilliant discoveries in a variety of fields including mathematics, geometry, mechanics and hydrostatics. In addition, he was an inventor and an engineer and even late in life designed brilliant war machines to aid in the defense of his city. Archimedes contributions to mathematics were also notable, and included solutions to a variety of problems. He was the first to prove that the surface area and volume of a sphere were exactly 2/3rds that of a cylinder of a similar height. He worked with mathematics limits and series in a manner that is similar to calculus, and in a treatise on 'counting grains of sand', he made innovative use of the manner of calculating very large numbers before the decimal system was established. Some of Archimedes inventions were just as noteworthy as his scientific achievements. The Archimedes Screw was a devices for lifting water. The Archimedes Claw was a war weapon used to overturn boats that approached the walls of Syracuse during the siege, and he is also credited with improving variou Archimedes
Although little is known of his private life, there are several well known anecdotes about Archimedes relating to his discoveries. The most famous of course, was his clever method of determining whether a goldsmith hired to create a crown for the King of Syracuse had cheated his client by substituting silver in place of gold. Archimedes determined that the amount of gold required to displace the same amount of water as the king's crown should precisely equal the weight of the gold used by the goldsmith to make the crown, and if there was a discrepancy it would mean that the king had been cheated. This law of buoyancy is still known as Archimedes Principle. Quick Info
Syracuse, Sicily (now Italy)
Syracuse, Sicily (now Italy) Biography
Archimedes' father was Phidias, an astronomer. We know nothing else about Phidias other than this one fact and we only know this since Archimedes gives us this information in one of his works, The Sandreckoner. A friend of Archimedes called Heracleides wrote a biography of him but sadly this work is lost. How our knowledge of Archimedes would be transformed if this lost work were ever found, or even extracts found in the writing of others.
Archimedes was a native of Syracuse, Sicily. It is reported by some authors that he visited Egypt and there invented a device now known as Archimedes' screw. This is a pump, still used in many parts of the world. It is highly likely that, when he was a young man, Archimedes studied with the successors of Euclid in Alexandria. Certainly he was completely familiar with the mathematics developed there, but what makes this conjecture much more certain, he knew personally the mathematicians working there and he sent his results to Alexandria with personal messages. He regarded Conon of Samos, one of the mathematicians at Alexandria, both very highly for his abilities as a mathematician and he also regarded him as a close friend.
In the preface to On spirals Archimedes relates an amusing story regarding his friends in Alexandria. He tells us that he was in the habit of sending them statements of his latest theorems, but without giving proofs. Apparently some of the mathematicians there had claimed the results as their own so Archimedes says that on the last occasion when he sent them theorems he included two wh