- For example, the work of Abu Kamil, who was an African mathematician around the year 850.

His work is known to us as the work of Fibonacci, Leonardo of Pisa, who came 400 years later in Italy.

- Good evening and welcome to the third installment of the Nile Valley Conference, which was held at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia.

Perhaps the most painful thing for a person, a student, is to accept the fact that much of what he has been taught were half truths and lies.

For the Black child who is led to believe that his people were always slaves, the reading of history can be as frustrating as trying to blow up a balloon with holes in it.

For the white child who is led to believe that his people were always masters, the reading of history can produce a balloon with too much air in it.

A balloon that, over time, will burst from the pressure of truth.

Millions of Black and white children have gone through the school system of this state, of this country, believing that the Greeks were the developers of mathematics.

Not so, says our guest, Dr. Beatrice Lumpkin, associate professor of mathematics at Malcolm X College in Chicago.

Dr. Lumpkin has written on the Afro-Asian foundation of mathematics for Freedomways, The Mathematics Teacher, Science and Society, and Historia Mathematica.

She is the author of a children's book, "Young Genius in Old Egypt."

We asked Dr. Lumpkin, what are the children in the classrooms of this country being taught about the beginnings of mathematics?

- I would say very little, if anything.

Because, unfortunately, mathematics is presented as something full blown, like Minerva out of Zeus's head.

And the real history of mathematics, were it known, would be something that would inspire us and help us in the study of mathematics.

There is indirectly something said about the beginning of mathematics in that there are some pictures of mathematicians that are in mathematics books.

And, for example, Hypatia.

She is one of the few women, that we know of, who have led the way in mathematics, and often her picture is shown.

But this is not a true picture because there are no actual portraits.

And so Hypatia, who was an Egyptian algebraist, who gave her life for algebra, who lived in Alexandria, a city of the Nile Valley in Africa, is shown as fair complexion, straight hair, and as a European Greek.

And so, indirectly, history is taught, but it's taught falsely, when the fact is we could learn and benefit so much from the true history.

And then the picture that's given is either mathematics had no history, and here it is, and, "We are here to intimidate you," and, "If you can't do it, then you're dumb," or the little bit of history that is given indirectly is often false history.

- What can you tell us about the true beginnings of mathematics?

- For the true beginnings of mathematics, we would have to go back to Africa.

Because Africa is the birthplace of the human race, and wherever there were human beings, there was mathematics, numbers.

You think of numbers with mathematics.

Right?

- [Listervelt] Right.

- Then every language has number words, and every language has a structure of logic that we need for mathematics.

In particular, if we are talking about Britain history of mathematics, we must go to the Nile Valley.

We must go to Egypt.

Because the first written numbers were recorded in ancient Egypt.

And that's a very good beginning.

- What role... What role did the Africans play in developing certain mathematical principles?

- Of course, when you ask that question, we'll have to state that the Egyptians were Africans.

We can't take this for granted because, again, there is so much distortion of history.

Now, if I may then, taking your question about African contributions to mathematics, look at the mathematics of ancient Egypt.

They could do then everything we teach in elementary school today.

Addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, fractions, all of the principles of algebra were developed and used in ancient Egypt.

And why did they do this?

Because they needed it in the development of the advanced civilization they were building.

You couldn't begin to build, not only the pyramids but even a palace or a large granary, without a plan.

To have a plan, you have to measure.

To measure, you have to have fractions.

And so all of this was needed and developed in ancient Egypt.

Now, take geometry.

Every year the Nile River overflowed, and that's what made Egypt so rich.

But there was one thing wrong with it.

It wiped out all the farm boundaries.

Then, every year you had to redraw them.

You could not do this accurately without geometry.

Now, you know how neighbors in our own town might have a very big argument about one foot of land if that isn't really clear, then you can imagine the need for accurate boundaries between farms, which were your living.

And so the science of geometry was very advanced, and the Greeks admitted, when they came much, much later, almost 3000 years later, that they learned their geometry from Egypt.

- What did the ancient world have to say about the beginnings and development of mathematics?

- Well, I think, in the first place, we have to realize that most of the ancient world was not saying anything, at least not in writing, in a way where it would come down to us.

In ancient times, most of Europe had no alphabet.

They had no writing.

If you are talking about ancient Greece, for example... - [Listervelt] Right.

- they sent their best students, their best scholars to Egypt to bring back all of this wonderful knowledge that had been developed thousands of years earlier.

And so they looked on Egypt as their teacher, as their mother.

And even in the Middle Ages this was so, that Egypt was looked upon as the main source of knowledge.

This has only changed in recent years.

- Who were some of the Greek personalities that have taken credit or have been given credit for genius in mathematics?

- That's a very good question because, in ancient Egypt, the individual wasn't all that important.

There was a greater feeling of community.

And so many of the great writings, papyri, in mathematics are not signed.

We don't know their names.

We do know of the name of the scribe who copied or wrote the Ahmose Papyrus.

Ahmose was his name.

And much of the Egyptian mathematics we know through the papyrus he wrote.

But we do not know the names of the others, but we know them by their work.

But since that time, for example, the work of Abu Kamil, who was an African mathematician around the year 850, his work is known to us as the work of Fibonacci, Leonardo of Pisa, who came 400 years later in Italy.

The Pythagorean theorem is... That Pythagoras is one of the names we think of most often when we first learn our mathematics.

But his theorem, which deals with the sides of a right triangle and their relationships, so that if you know two sides, you can find the third, that theorem has become very important in terms of measurement, of the whole basis of our Euclidean geometry.

That's great.

Let's take the name Euclid.

- [Listervelt] Right, okay.

That's coming up, but go ahead.

- Okay, if it's coming up, I'll wait.

- [Listervelt] Go ahead.

- But long before Pythagoras, this theorem was known in the ancient world.

Pythagoras brought his knowledge of this theorem to Europe from Asia and Africa.

Now, Pythagoras himself studied in Egypt for 20 years.

And so this is a clear example of a European name, Pythagoras, attached to a very important theorem that was known to Africa and Asia long before Pythagoras was born.

And I can think of many other examples.

- Would it be fair to say that this was the first busing?

Who was Euclid, who... - That's a very interesting question.

(both laugh) - I see it stopped you.

I see it stopped you.

(both laugh) Who was... - Deep.

- Pardon me?

- Deep.

- Who was Euclid and what was he famous for?

- Euclid is probably, for us, the most famous ancient mathematician.

He's famous for his book, "The Elements," 13 books on geometry and number theory.

Euclid of Alexandria, we must say, because there were other Euclids.

But where is Alexandria?

It's in Africa.

It's on the Nile River.

And so Euclid was an Egyptian but he's misrepresented for no reason based on fact, solely on prejudice.

He's misrepresented as a European, but Euclid, to the extent of the historical record, lived his entire life in Alexandria.

And that is where he laid the basis for our modern geometry.

- When did historians begin to deny Africans in Egypt the role they played in the development of mathematics?

- On the scale of world history, I would say very recently.

It was only in the 18th century, with the beginning of colonialism and with the development of slavery as an important economic base with the invention of the cotton gin, that the opinion and the history that had been given for thousands of years, that the basis of our knowledge came from Egypt, that this was totally changed around and instead of the knowledge going from Egypt to Greece, it suddenly appeared in Greece, on the continent of Europe, and nothing was done of any value anyplace else.

Another period that's totally neglected, suppressed, ignored is the period of Muslim mathematics.

And I don't mean the religion now, but that was the development in the Middle Ages in ancient Egypt and Asia.

And across all of North Africa there were great developments.

I shouldn't say only North Africa, because we have to take this down to Timbuktu, which was part of this whole development, that this knowledge directly triggered the Renaissance in Europe.

And at the time these great African scientists were advancing science beyond what the ancients had done, at this time, there were the so-called Dark Ages in Europe, where very few people were literate, none of this mathematics was known.

You were considered, in those days, a brilliant university graduate if you could multiply 25 by 13.

That was an advanced study.

At the same time, in North Africa and in Egypt, the mathematicians of this time were doing very advanced algebra, trigonometry, laying the basis for calculus.

- Talk some, if you will, about how the Muslims came in touch with Egyptian mathematics and what they did with it.

- About 626 or so, the Muslims came into Egypt.

And of course they found there this advanced knowledge, far above what they had been aware of before.

And the Arabs who came in had the great ability to recognize a good thing when they saw it.

And so rather than suppressing the native Egyptian culture, they encouraged it, they learned from it, and, like every other invader that has gone to Egypt, they were absorbed and became part of the Egyptian culture.

So when we say "Muslim mathematicians," these are not necessarily, and in most cases, Arabs.

But the Africans who were in Egypt continued, under Muslim rule, to develop mathematics, but they now wrote in Arabic, and advanced it beyond what it had been before by building observatories.

See, all through the years, technology had developed, and mathematics was given a big boost by the advanced technology.

Once they built the observatory outside of Cairo in about 1900 AD, once they built that, then they needed more mathematics for their calculations.

And so, far beyond what had taken place during so-called Hellenistic times, far beyond that, the Muslim mathematicians took their knowledge up to the point that preceded the present modern mathematical period.

- [Listervelt] Did they take this knowledge into Europe at all?

- They did Europe the very great favor of bringing some of their mathematical books, a famous book on algebra in the ninth century.

And slowly but surely, the Europeans woke up to this great science that was flourishing in Africa and Asia.

And in fact, the entire Renaissance was founded on and triggered by the knowledge from Africa and Asia.

And by the way, they acknowledged it too.

- Okay.

Why did historians begin to deny Egypt the role she played in the development of mathematics?

- I think you would have to say which historians.

Because historians acknowledged, certainly the Greek historians, Herodotus, acknowledged fully their debt to Egypt.

And in the Middle Ages, this was acknowledged as well.

It wasn't until the 18th century, with the development of colonialism and when slavery became an important economic base, that they could no longer tell the truth.

Because, if they were to admit that all of their science and mathematics and philosophy and even literature were based on this ancient knowledge and the knowledge they gained in the Middle Ages from Africa, how could they justify slavery?

How could they justify carving up the body of Africa?

And so it was really fairly recent.

If you take the timeline of history, starting with written history, going back to 33, 3400 BC, it was only in the last 2 or 300 years that this kind of lie began to be told, that all knowledge came from Europe, when the truth is it had its foundation in Africa.

- [Listervelt] Many people, or some people watching this might say, "Well, why are they quibbling, quote, 'quibbling,' about who developed mathematics?

What's the significance of all of this?"

- I think it's very significant, especially to a mathematics teacher.

First, if you deny a people their history, it becomes easier to exploit them.

If you deny a people their history, in the first place, the people you are denying are impoverished.

But in my thinking, the whole human race then is impoverished, because you are distorting history, you are creating division, and you are feeding racism, which is the greatest poison that is holding us back.

And so it's not just who did what.

In fact, the ancient Egyptians didn't even take credit individually.

It's not so much the names, but it's restoring our respect for each other.

Now, for a mathematics teacher, there's another reason this is important.

You know people tend to be...

In our country, 'cause I have traveled to other countries and I didn't find the fear of mathematics that I find here.

People tend to be intimidated when you say, "Mathematics."

But if they realize, if we taught history the way we should, they would see that mathematics had a beginning.

It wasn't anything to be afraid of.

People had to learn to count.

We can all count.

They had to learn to add, multiply, and, step by step, our present mathematics was built.

But it took 4,000 years.

Or more, 5,000.

So if we show this to our students, Black and white, women as well as men, if we show them that this is a step-by-step thing, then they will learn mathematics, really get into it, and not have this math anxiety.

But you see, if we don't go back to the beginning, then we can't do it step by step.

So that's another reason why I think it's so important.

- Okay.

You just touched on this, but I'll ask it anyway.

How can the teaching of Black history help turn on students to mathematics?

- Well, it can make it so exciting.

For example, we don't have enough women in mathematics.

There aren't enough students from the minorities going into mathematics.

But today there's a big door that goes through to the good jobs and a big lock on it.

Now, we didn't put the lock there, but that lock says, "Mathematics."

If you can't open that lock, you can't go through to so many of the jobs.

And that's an intimidating thing.

People don't learn when they're intimidated.

But if we can show that it's human, if we can tell the girls, for example, that there was a woman named Hypatia, a Black woman in Egypt, who was the greatest algebraist of that time, then of course they'll feel more encouraged.

And I like to tell my students about Hatshepsut, but I don't know if you have the time to hear about her.

- [Listervelt] Go ahead.

Tell us about Hatshepsut.

- She was Queen Hatshepsut of Egypt.

And in her time, this was a time of peace, and the greatest buildings, temples, obelisks were erected during her reign.

Well, this was good, but she felt, to safeguard everything that had been built under her leadership, it wasn't enough to be queen,, because a queen rules on a temporary basis.

Why not be king?

It didn't take much.

All it took was her having a dream that the god Amon had come to her mother at the moment that she, Hatshepsut, was being conceived.

So he was her true father, and he proclaimed in her dream that she was to be not queen but the Pharaoh.

And so the miracle was proclaimed, and all it took was putting the double crown of Egypt on her head and a beard.

But the beard was gold.

It was ceremonial anyway.

And so she was the only woman in history, the only queen who became king.

And I think that's the kind of story that convinces our young women that they can do anything if they get a little help... - [Listervelt] Okay.

- and put their mind to it.

- [Listervelt] Well, you've helped us a lot.

Thank you.

- My pleasure.

- [Listervelt] All right.

- I've enjoyed it.

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