Military Mathematics in the Spanish Colonies
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Mathematics and the Military in the early Spanish colonies. C Edward Sandifer*, Western Connecticut State U (983-C1-142) esandifer@earthlink.net Spanish colonial mathematics books were more concerned with problems the colonists themselves faced than with abstractions. They spent a conspicuous amount of energy designing marching formations, and a good deal formulating gunpowder recipes. We will see what some texts from the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in Central and South American have to say about this. 1 Purposes to note how Spanish colonial mathematics fits into a larger pattern of colonial studies 1. Threshold, like writing, that distinguishes some cultures from others. 2. Microcosm of the development of mathematics in emerging cultures, more recent, and sometimes better documented, than ancient mathematics. 3. Were Belgian, Italian, French colonies different from Spanish, English, Dutch because they didn’t export mathematics? Did Portuguese “change sides?” to show the continuity of Spanish colonial mathematics culture, that one book leads to another to show some illustrations that didn’t make it in to the College Mathematics Journal article to promote role models for Latino students 2 Colonial issues • another way to look at colonialism • another venue for investigating the link between mathematics and culture Other work • Abayasha Agarwahl – British colonial mathematics in India, Australia and New Zealand • Sergio Nobre – Portuguese colonial mathematics in Brazil • Elizabeth Rogers – other Spanish Colonial issues • Bruce Burdick – adding to the list of Spanish Colonial texts 3 Karpinski 11 texts before 1700 two threads, tangled with arithmetic military, tabular 1556 1583 1584 1587 1597 Juan Diez Freyle Sumario tables, arithmetic Diego Garcia de Palacio Diálogos Militares military Pragmatica other Diego Garcia de Palacio Instrución náuthica military Joan de Belveder reduciones de plata tables 1607 Francisco Juan Garreguilla plata reduzida tables 1615 D. Alvaro Fuentes y de la Cerda quentas, y reduccines tables? (lost) 1623 Pedro de Paz Arte para aprender arithmetic, “sin maestro” Atanasius Reaton Arte menor de arismética arithmetic, military. “sin maestro” 1649 1675 Benito Fernandes de Belo Breve aritmética 1696 Juan Ramón Koninkius Cubus, et sphaera 4 arithmetic, military other 1583 Diego Garcia de Palacio Diálogos Militares 5 6 1587 Diego Garcia de Palacio Instrución náuthica 7 8 9 1675 Benito Fernandes de Belo Breve aritmética www.wcsu.ctstateu.edu/~Sandifer follow link to Breve Aritmetica 10
