Pi and Rectangle
Date: Fall 2011
Can the number representing Pi be used to measure a rectangle?
Amazingly, yes. In the Babylonian Talmud (Succoth 8.), there is a
discussion about the area of a circle. They create many concentric
ropes to fill the circle. The then slit it and fan it out to form an
isosceles triangle. This triangle is then bisected from the apex
into two right triangles. One of the right triangles is brought
around to form a rectangle. One side of the rectangle is the radius
of the circle, and the other side is half the circumference (0.5 * 2 pi r).
Nathan A. Unterman
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Update: June 2012