Archimedes and the Palimpsest

Infinite Secrets AIRING SEPTEMBER 30, 2003

When most people hear the name In 1906, Danish scholar Johan Ludwig Archimedes Archimedes, they picture a gaunt figure Heiberg received word that the with a long beard screaming “Eureka!” Palimpsest was located in a library and the and running around the streets naked, in Constantinople. After traveling dripping with bathwater.Whether such there, Heiberg attempted to recon- a scene ever occurred is debatable, but struct Archimedes’work, with only a Palimpsest what is certain is that Archimedes was magnifying glass to aid him.The a man obsessed with numbers. In his manuscript is being more closely lifetime he found a good approximation examined today, with the help of digital for pi; calculated the areas of a circle enhancement and ultraviolet light. and a sphere; and developed a system for expressing large numbers. And NOVA’s “Infinite Secrets” program on the side, he found time to invent introduces the scientists, translators, military devices and discover the and curators who are deciphering and principle of buoyancy. preserving Archimedes’ text.The pro- gram documents Archimedes’ many Although Archimedes was on the verge contributions to the fields of math and of inventing calculus around 250 B.C., science and describes the importance of it wasn’t until nearly 2,000 years later the Palimpsest, the only copy of work that Sir Isaac Newton published The by Archimedes that describes how he Principia, a work in which Newton made his discoveries. “Infinite Secrets” developed the laws of both modern also asks the question: If Archimedes’ physics and calculus. Why the delay? manuscript had not been lost, how Unfortunately, much of Archimedes’ much further advanced would the fields work was lost until modern times.The of math and science be today? earliest known copy of his work—a manuscript created more than 1,000 years after Archimedes died—was “recycled” by Christian monks in the Middle Ages to use as a prayer book. They scraped or washed the pages, rotated the manuscript 90 degrees, and wrote over the ancient text.This created a book known as a palimpsest.

What Is a Palimpsest? A palimpsest (pal´imp-sest´)˘ ˘ ˘ is a book in in the drawings to the left, the which the original text has been erased Archimedes Palimpsest was made by and the pages written on again.The taking the original manuscript apart, word palimpsest is derived from a Greek scraping off the text, cutting the pages word meaning “scraped again.”These in half, rotating the pages, writing books were usually made out of papy rus over the original text, and rebinding Source:The Walters Art Gallery or parchment (sheepskin).As illustrated the book. ww w. t h ew a l t e r s . o r g / a r chi m e d e s

W W W . P B S . O R G / N O V A / A R C H I M E D E S