Excerpts from Dharampalji's book Indian Science and Technology in the 18th Century (1971)
This article consists of excerpts taken from the above book, which was edited by Dharampal (1971). The book contains accounts by Europeans who visited India in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
It is astonishing to learn from these accounts that our ancestors could apparently predict the motions of the planets (well before the advent of Newtonian mechanics). They had a good estimate of π (≈ 3927/1250 = 3.1416), and were aware of the binomial coefficients for integral values of the exponent (several centuries before the general case was stated without proof by Newton in 1676). They also constructed solutions of certain algebraic equations several centuries before these solutions were reinvented in France and England.
They were adept at inoculating people against small-pox (over 100 years before the introduction of inoculation in Britain); they could make ice by exploiting radiative transfer from pans of water exposed to the atmosphere; they had a sound knowledge of agriculture practices; could make steel bars of good quality (without foreign collaboration); and could perform plastic surgery.
These topics are described in the excerpts given below. Supplementary remarks have been added at a few places. These are enclosed by square brackets.
By K. Kesava Rao
Department of Chemical Engineering
Indian Institute of Science
Bengaluru 560012, India
kesava@iisc.ac.in
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This article consists of excerpts taken from the above book, which was edited by Dharampal (1971). The book contains accounts by Europeans who visited India in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
It is astonishing to learn from these accounts that our ancestors could apparently predict the motions of the planets (well before the advent of Newtonian mechanics). They had a good estimate of π (≈ 3927/1250 = 3.1416), and were aware of the binomial coefficients for integral values of the exponent (several centuries before the general case was stated without proof by Newton in 1676). They also constructed solutions of certain algebraic equations several centuries before these solutions were reinvented in France and England.
They were adept at inoculating people against small-pox (over 100 years before the introduction of inoculation in Britain); they could make ice by exploiting radiative transfer from pans of water exposed to the atmosphere; they had a sound knowledge of agriculture practices; could make steel bars of good quality (without foreign collaboration); and could perform plastic surgery.
These topics are described in the excerpts given below. Supplementary remarks have been added at a few places. These are enclosed by square brackets.
By K. Kesava Rao
Department of Chemical Engineering
Indian Institute of Science
Bengaluru 560012, India
kesava@iisc.ac.in
...To be continued ...
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