The "loculus Archimedius" no doubt is the puzzle described by Archimedes in
his Stomachion. A discussion of the content of the Stomachion as well as a
quick tour through the classical literature on similar puzzles can be found
in Dijksterhuis' Archimedes, Chapter XV (I do not think Tangram is
mentioned at all, though).
Eisso Atzema
At 08:46 PM 4/27/99 -0500, you wrote:
>
>There is a diagram and discussion of the "loculus Archimedius" in the
>book "Alexandria: The Golden City" by Harold Thayer Davis (Principia
>Press of Illinois, 1957). It's like a Tangram, consisting of 14
>shapes, mostly triangles, with a couple of quadrilaterals and
>irregular pentagons, and the puzzle as Davis presents it is to fit
>them together into a square.
>
>In notes at the end of the book, Davis says "The loculus Archimedius
>is described by W.W.R. Ball in this 'Mathematical Recreations,' 10th
>edition, 1931, p. 54. The construction is ascribed to H. Suter in
>'Zeitschrift fur Math. und Physik,' Vol. 44, 1899, pp. 491-499." I
>don't have access to either of those references, but I did look in
>both the 6th (1914) and 11th (1939) editions of Ball's book and did
>not find any mention of the loculus. Maybe I missed it.
>
>Davis's book is an engagingly readable history of Alexandria, and it
>lavishes a lot of attention on mathematicians associated with the
>city. This surprised me until I did some digging and found that Davis
>himself was a mathematician. I heartily recommend the book. Some
>enterprising publisher should reprint it.
>
>Barry Cipra
>cipra@microassist.com
>
Eisso Atzema, Ph.D.
Department of Mathematics & Statistics
University of Maine
Orono, ME 04469
tel.: (207) 581-3928 (off.)
(207) 990-4680 (home)
e-mail: atzema@gauss.umemat.maine.edu (preferred)
eisso.atzema@umit.maine.edu (FirstClass)