ProofWiki:Mathematicians/Sorted By Birth/501 - 1000 CE

For more comprehensive information on the lives and works of mathematicians through the ages, see the MacTutor History of Mathematics archive, created by John J. O'Connor and Edmund F. Robertson.

"The army of those who have made at least one definite contribution to mathematics as we know it soon becomes a mob as we look back over history; 6,000 or 8,000 names press forward for some word from us to preserve them from oblivion, and once the bolder leaders have been recognised it becomes largely a matter of arbitrary, illogical legislation to judge who of the clamouring multitude shall be permitted to survive and who be condemned to be forgotten."

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501 - 600

Brahmagupta

598 – 668

Indian mathematician and astronomer.

Gave definitive solutions to the general linear equation, and also the general Quadratic Equation.

Best known for the Brahmagupta-Fibonacci Identity.
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Bhāskara I

c. 600 – c. 680

Indian mathematician who was the first on record to use Hindu-Arabic numerals complete with a symbol for zero.

Gave an approximation of the sine function in his Āryabhaṭīyabhāṣya of 629 CE.
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701 - 800

Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi

c. 780 – c. 850

Full name: محمد بن موسى ابو جعفر الخوارزمي‎ - Muḥammad bin Mūsā Abū Ǧaʿfar al-Ḫawārazmī.

Mathematician who lived and worked in Baghdad.

Famous for his book The Algebra, which contained the first systematic description of the solution to linear and quadratic equations.

Sometimes referred to as "the father of algebra", but some claim the title should belong to Diophantus.
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801 - 900

Mahāvīrāchārya

c. 800 – c. 870

Mahāvīrāchārya (literally: Mahāvīrā the teacher) was an Indian mathematician best known for separating the subject of mathematics from that of astrology.

Gave the sum of a series whose terms are squares of an arithmetical progression and empirical rules for area and perimeter of an ellipse.
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901 - 1000

Abū Bakr al-Karajī

c. 953 – c. 1029

Full name: Abū Bakr ibn Muḥammad ibn al Ḥusayn al-Karajī (or al-Karkhī).

Persian mathematician best known for the Binomial Theorem and what is now known as Pascal's Rule for their combination.

Also one of the first to use the Principle of Mathematical Induction.
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Alhazen Ibn al-Haytham

965 – c. 1039

Full name:

• Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥasan ibn al-Ḥasan ibn al-Haytham
• In Arabic: ابو علي، حسن بن حسن بن الهيثم
• In Persian: ابن هیثم

Best known as Alhacen or (deprecated) Alhazen.

Persian philosopher, scientist and all-round genius who made significant contributions to number theory and geometry.

His work influenced the work of René Descartes and the calculus of Isaac Newton.
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