A 30-Times Table
Below is an example of an Old Babylonian cuneiform tablet showing a standard
multiplication table with principal number 30. The tablet is UM
29-15-503, from the University of Pennsylvania. The tablet is an example
of a type that is common for compound tables, but less common for single
multiplication tables. It begins with the line '1 30'
and then continues '
2 1', '3 1,30'
and so on through the table. The multiplication table takes up both
sides of the tablet, and ends with '50 25'. See the
page on Old
Babylonian multiplication tables for more details.
This tablet was originally published by Neugebauer and Sachs in Mathematical
Cuneiform Texts.
I thank Professor E. Leichty for permission to use the images of the
tablets.
Go to Mesopotamian
Mathematics.
Last modified: 6 June 2001
Duncan J. Melville
dmelville@stlawu.edu