> Can you draw a parabola/ellipse with only a straight edge and a compass?
>
> I know that you can draw an ellipse with a string and two focal points,
> but is that how the ancient Greeks drew it?
Even though my copy of Euclid (Dover) has ellipses on the cover, they
don't show up in the index.
I would appreciate any information.
Mike
-- Mike Robison Math graduate student and occasional amateur historian Michigan State University