Eratosthenes | Biography, Discoveries, Sieve, & Facts (2024)

Greek scientist

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Also known as: Eratosthenes of Cyrene

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Article History

Eratosthenes' method of measuring Earth's circumference

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In full:
Eratosthenes of Cyrene
Born:
c. 276 bce, Cyrene, Libya
Died:
c. 194 bce, Alexandria, Egypt
Subjects Of Study:
Earth
circumference
sieve of Eratosthenes

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Top Questions

What were Eratosthenes’ major achievements?

In addition to calculating Earth’s circumference, Eratosthenes created the Sieve of Eratosthenes (a procedure for finding prime numbers), tried to fix the dates of literary and political events since the siege of Troy, and is thought to have created the armillary sphere (an early astronomical device for representing the great circles of the heavens).

What is Eratosthenes famous for?

Eratosthenes measured Earth’s circumference mathematically using two surface points to make the calculation. He noted that the Sun’s rays fell vertically at noon in Syene (now Aswān), Egypt, at the summer solstice. In Alexandria, also in Egypt, at the same date and time, sunlight fell at an angle of about 7.2° from the vertical.

How did Eratosthenes die?

Eratosthenes died in his 80s in Alexandria, Egypt. He had become blind in his old age and could no longer work by 195 BCE.He reportedly fell into despair, and he is said to have committed suicide by voluntary starvation in 194 as a result.

Eratosthenes (born c. 276 bce, Cyrene, Libya—died c. 194 bce, Alexandria, Egypt) was a Greek scientific writer, astronomer, and poet, who made the first measurement of the size of Earth for which any details are known.

At Syene (now Aswān), some 800 km (500 miles) southeast of Alexandria in Egypt, the Sun’s rays fall vertically at noon at the summer solstice. Eratosthenes noted that at Alexandria, at the same date and time, sunlight fell at an angle of about 7.2° from the vertical. (Writing before the Greeks adopted the degree, a Babylonian unit of measure, he actually said “a fiftieth of a circle.”) He correctly assumed the Sun’s distance to be very great; its rays therefore are practically parallel when they reach Earth. Given an estimate of the distance between the two cities, he was able to calculate the circumference of Earth, obtaining 250,000 stadia. Earlier estimates of the circumference of Earth had been made (for example, Aristotle says that “some mathematicians” had obtained a value of 400,000 stadia), but no details of their methods have survived. An account of Eratosthenes’ method is preserved in the Greek astronomer Cleomedes’ Meteora. The exact length of the units (stadia) he used is doubtful, and the accuracy of his result is therefore uncertain. His measurement of Earth’s circumference may have varied by 0.5 to 17 percent from the value accepted by modern astronomers, but it was certainly in the right range. He also measured the degree of obliquity of the ecliptic (in effect, the tilt of Earth’s axis) and wrote a treatise on the octaëteris, an eight-year lunar-solar cycle. He is credited with devising an algorithm for finding prime numbers called the sieve of Eratosthenes, in which one arranges the natural numbers in numerical order and strikes out one, every second number following two, every third number following three, and so on, which just leaves the prime numbers.

Britannica QuizFaces of Science

Eratosthenes’ only surviving work is Catasterisms, a book about the constellations, which gives a description and story for each constellation, as well as a count of the number of stars contained in it, but the attribution of this work has been doubted by some scholars. His mathematical work is known principally from the writings of the Greek geometer Pappus of Alexandria, and his geographical work from the first two books of the Geography of the Greek geographer Strabo.

After study in Alexandria and Athens, Eratosthenes settled in Alexandria about 255 bce and became director of the great library there. He tried to fix the dates of literary and political events since the siege of Troy. His writings included a poem inspired by astronomy, as well as works on the theatre and on ethics. Eratosthenes was afflicted by blindness in his old age, and he is said to have committed suicide by voluntary starvation.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThis article was most recently revised and updated by Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Eratosthenes | Biography, Discoveries, Sieve, & Facts (2024)

FAQs

Eratosthenes | Biography, Discoveries, Sieve, & Facts? ›

In addition to calculating Earth's circumference, Eratosthenes created the Sieve of Eratosthenes (a procedure for finding prime numbers), tried to fix the dates of literary and political events since the siege of Troy, and is thought to have created the armillary sphere (an early astronomical device for representing ...

What discoveries did Eratosthenes determine? ›

Eratosthenes was also the first to calculate the tilt of the Earth's axis, which he figured with remarkable accuracy; the finding was reported by Ptolemy (85-165 CE). Eratosthenes also calculated the distance from the Earth to the Moon and to the Sun, but with less accuracy. He made a catalog of 675 stars.

What is the Sieve of Eratosthenes history? ›

The 3rd-century bc Greek scientist Eratosthenes of Cyrene developed a systematic procedure for finding prime numbers that is known as the sieve of Eratosthenes. Prime numbers are not divisible by an integer greater than 1, except themselves. The procedure results in all the natural numbers (1, 2, 3…)

What is the Sieve of Eratosthenes research? ›

The Sieve of Eratosthenes works on the idea that the multiples of a prime number are themselves not prime. When searching for primes, then, all of the multiples of each prime can be crossed out. This eliminates many numbers that would otherwise have been tested for no reason, so it saves time.

What was the Sieve of Eratosthenes observation? ›

Given a number n, print all primes smaller than or equal to n. It is also given that n is a small number. The sieve of Eratosthenes is one of the most efficient ways to find all primes smaller than n when n is smaller than 10 million or so.

What are some interesting facts about Eratosthenes? ›

Eratosthenes was an ancient Greek mathematician, geographer, and astronomer. He existed from 276 B.C. until 194 B.C. and is most notable for having the first accurate calculation of the Earth's circumference. He lived and worked in the Egyptian city of Alexandria for much of his life.

Who invented the sieve? ›

The Sieve of Eratosthenes is an ancient method of finding prime numbers up to a specified integer. This method was invented by the ancient Greek mathematician Eratosthenes. There are several other methods used to determine whether a number is prime or composite.

What is the Sieve of Eratosthenes used to find? ›

In mathematics, the sieve of Eratosthenes is an ancient algorithm for finding all prime numbers up to any given limit.

Is Sieve of Eratosthenes faster? ›

However, for the simple implementations of the Sieve of Eratosthenes using a vector<bool> is faster. You are limited by how fast you can load the data into the cache, and therefore using less memory gives a big advantage.

Why did Eratosthenes measure the Earth? ›

Eratosthenes was fascinated with geography and planned to make a map of the entire world. He realized he needed to know the size of Earth. Obviously, one couldn't walk all the way around to figure it out.

What is the true Sieve of Eratosthenes? ›

Definition. The sieve of Eratosthenes algorithm is an ancient algorithm that is used to find all the prime numbers less than given number T. It can be done using O(n*log(log(n))) operations. Using this algorithm we can eliminate all the numbers which are not prime and those that are less than given T.

What is the Sieve of Eratosthenes task? ›

The Sieve of Eratosthenes is a very simple and popular technique for finding all the prime numbers in the range from 2 to a given number n. The algorithm takes its name from the process of sieving—in a simple way we remove multiples of consecutive numbers. Initially, we have the set of all the numbers {2,3,...,n}.

What is the Sieve of Eratosthenes in Greek? ›

In mathematics, the sieve of Eratosthenes (Greek: κόσκινον Ἐρατοσθένους), one of a number of prime number sieves, is a simple, ancient algorithm for finding all prime numbers up to any given limit.

What is the Sieve of Eratosthenes lesson? ›

This particular sieve rules out composite numbers, leaving only primes. Eratosthenes' innovation was to find prime numbers by process of elimination. Counting by 2's up to 100, he could easily prove that 50 of those numbers were not prime. Next he would count up by 3's, 5's, 7's, and so on.

What are the Sieve of Eratosthenes 1 to 100? ›

The Prime numbers from 1 to 100 are 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29, 31, 37, 41, 43, 47, 53, 59, 61, 67, 71, 73, 79, 83, 89, and 97.

What is the sieve method? ›

Sieving is a method of using a sieve to distinguish small particles from bigger particles. It is used in flour mills or building sites. Impurities such as husks and stones are extracted from wheat at flour mill. They remove pebbles and stones from sand through sieving.

What did Eratosthenes accurately measure? ›

The Earth's circumference was first accurately measured more than 2,200 years ago by a Greek astronomer named Eratosthenes. Eratosthenes method was very simple; he measured the length of a shadow from a vertical stick of a known height in two cities on the same day.

Why is Eratosthenes known as the father of geography? ›

Eratosthenes, the ancient Greek scholar is called the 'father of geography. He was the first one to use the word geography and he also had a small-scale notion of the planet that helped him to determine the circumference of the earth. About Eratosthenes: Eratosthenes was multi-talented.

Where did Eratosthenes perform his experiment? ›

On that day, the sun at noon was directly overhead at Aswan. On the same day, Eratosthenes measured the shadow of the a stick at noon in Alexandria. The length of that shadow was not zero because the sun was not directly overhead in Alexandria.

How did Eratosthenes calculate the tilt of the Earth's axis? ›

At noon on the summer solstice, Eratosthenes measured the length of the shadow cast by a column of known height at Alexandria. With these two lengths, he could solve for the angle between them (θ).

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