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A Pinch of History
Indian Contribution to Geometry: The history of Indian Geometry is very rich. Even the scant
remnants of the Indus Valley Civilization excavated at Harappa and Mohenjodaro reveal their
acquaintance with Geometry. A geometrical instrument used to draw a circle was found in the
excavation sites which is said to be of 2500 BCE period. A pattern on pottery excavated at
Mohenjodaro is a series of intersecting circles made by drawing a series of vertical lines to
divide the surface of the jar into a number of nearly equal panels and then scratching circles
with a pair of dividers.
In Taitriya Samhita of Yajur Veda gives a rule to
construct a Mahavedi when side measurement was
given. In Sulba-Sutra (800 BCE) many methods of
constructing an altar are given. This is Tretha Agni.
In 800 BCE, the altar used at each household had
three geometrical shapes – a circle, a semicircle and a
square. Interestingly, the area of all the 3 shapes used
to be equal. Baudhayana, Manva, Apshtabha and their
contemporarys gave more than 30 rules to construct an altar, bisecting a line segment, angle
bisector, construction of polygons etc.

Construction of a Rectangle

Example 4: Draw a rectangle with sides of length 6 cm and 4 cm. After drawing, check if it satisfies
both the rectangle properties.
Solution: Steps of construction:

Step 1: Draw a line segment PQ of length 6 cm. P 6 cm Q
Step 2: Mark a point to draw a perpendicular to PQ through P.

Step 3: Mark point S on the perpendicular such that PS = 4 cm using a compass.

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