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A. F. HORADAM
Department of Mathematics
University of New England
"...considering both the originality and power of his methods, and the importance
of his results, we are abundantly justified in ranking Leonardo of Pisa as the
greatest genius in the field of number theory who appeared between the time of
Diophantus [4th century A.D.] and that of Fermat" [17th century] R.B. McClenon
[13]. [Numbers in square brackets refer to REFERENCES at the end of this
article.]
THE MAN
During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, many far-reaching changes in the
social, political and intellectual lives of people and nations were taking place.
Europe had emerged from the period of barbarian invasions and disruption known
as the Dark Ages. Improved techniques in farming had led to greater food
production, population growth and commercial expansion which were to pave the
way for the industrial, scientific and technological progress of later centuries.
Contacts with Eastern civilizations were made by the Crusaders, by curious
travellers and by merchants eager for trading opportunities.
By the end of the twelfth century, the struggle between the Papacy and the Holy
Roman Empire had left many Italian cities independent republics. Having
consolidated their military victories, many of these cities embarked on substantial
trading enterprises, and some established centers for higher learning. In particular,
ships from Genoa and Venice, laden with cargo for and from distant lands, helped
to extend the maritime dominions of these cities which became the capitals of
small empires.
Among these important and remarkable republics was the small but powerful
walled city-state of Pisa which played a major role in the commercial revolution
which was transforming Europe. A description of the many facets of the bustling
life of medieval Pisa (which is thought to have had a population of about 10,000)
may be found in Gies and Gies [4]. "Its citizens are brave", observed Benjamin of
Tudela, a Spanish Jew, "and they have neither king nor prince to whom they owe
obedience".
Into this world of change and cross-fertilisation of Christian and Moslem
cultures, Fibonacci, a man for all seasons, was born in Pisa.
Pisa today is best known for its leaning tower (inclined at an angle of about
161/2o to the vertical). Unknown to most people is a statue in the Giardino Scotto
erected by the citizens of Pisa to its most famous citizen, Fibonacci, the most
outstanding Western mathematician of the Middle Ages and a man very much in
advance of his time.
In this progressive and energetic city, Fibonacci was born in about 1175, i.e.,
about 800 years ago, though no one knows for certain the exact date of his birth.
We take this opportunity to publicise the man and his contributions to Mathematics.
From this tantalizingly brief glimpse of Fibonacci's life, we gain some insight
into his personality and the mathematical quality of his mind. Quite apart from the
intellectual curiosity and excitement which these passages reveal, they leave us
with a respect and warmth of feeling for the modest humility of the man.
"Leonardo's humility graces his genius", says Grimm [5].
No one knows when Fibonacci died nor under what circumstances his death
occurred. Within a few decades of his death, Pisa was disastrously defeated by
Genoa in the grim naval battle of Meloria and the decline of his native city had
irreversibly begun. The proud inscription on Pisa's "golden" sea gate, "Love
justice, ye rulers of the earth!" became a nostalgic memory of past grandeur.
What did Fibonacci look like? Did Fibonacci marry? Did he have any children?
What was the state of his health? his wealth? What were his political views? To
what extent, if at all, did he rely on the works of the Greeks (e.g. the (now) lost
books of Diophantus)? It is a great pity indeed that we do not know more about this
remarkable man.
THE MATHEMATICIAN
5. Fibonacci's works.
The mathematical writings of Fibonacci known to us and their dates are [2]:
Liber Abbaci (The Book of Calculation), 1202 (1228);
Practica Geometriae (The Practice of Geometry), 1220;
Liber Quadratorum (The Book of Square Numbers), 1225;
Flos (The Flower), 1225;
Letter to Master Theodore (cf. §3).
Though the title of the book suggests the use of the abacus, in fact Fibonacci
freed arithmetic from calculations using the abacus. He did this by introducing to
Western Europe in a clear, comprehensive and independent way, the new Hindu-
Arabic numerals which had been successfully used in the Middle East and the
Orient. McClenon [13] states that the Liber Abbaci was the "greatest arithmetic of
the middle ages and the first one to show by examples from every field the great
superiority of the Hindu-Arabic numeral system over the Roman system
exemplified by Boethius" (the arithmetic most generally taught throughout Europe
before the thirteenth century).
It was not, however, the first book written in Europe to use and explain the new
numerals, nor did it achieve the popularity of later, more elementary descriptions
such as that of the thirteenth century English schoolman, Sacrobosco (John of
Halifax).
Fibonacci's Liber Abbaci begins (page 2 of [2]) with the simplest but profound
statement:
987654321
With these nine figures, and with the sign 0 ... any number may be written, as
is demonstrated below.
With regard to the symbol 0 "which in Arabic is called zephirum" (quod arabice
zephirum appellatur [2]), we note that the words cipher and zero come from the
Arabic.
In the Liber Abbaci, Fibonacci explains (sometimes tediously) the nature of the
Hindu-Arabic numerals, their use in calculations with integers and fractions, and
their applications to practical commercial problems relating to weights and
measures, bartering, interest and money-changing. In the remainder of his book,
Fibonacci is more concerned with theoretical, rather than practical, problems, e.g.
Series and Proportions, the Extraction of Square and Cube Roots, the use of the
Rule of False Position, the Method of Casting out Nines (for checking calculations),
and other techniques discovered by the Hindu and Arab mathematicians. Finally, he
deals with geometry and algebra. For ease in calculation with the new numerals,
Fibonacci provides tables for the four arithmetical operations.
Recall that the symbols "+" and "-" were not invented until the fifteenth century
while "÷" appeared in the seventeenth century. Following precedent and necessity,
Fibonacci writes out these operations in words or else illustrates his calculations
with diagrams. There being no algebraic symbolism available to him, Fibonacci
uses res (thing) for the unknown x, and for x2 he writes quadratus numerus
(square number).
While discussing the merits of the new system of numeration, Fibonacci also
makes reference to the then current Roman numerals for comparison, and to the
sexagesimal system of the Babylonians. Not everyone, however, accepted the
usefulness of these Oriental symbols. For example, in 1299, Florentine merchants
issued an ordinance prohibiting the use of Hindu-Arabic numerals because it was
too easy for an unscrupulous person to write a sum of money, say 1000 lire, as
1999 lire. Such a fraudulent alteration was impossible in Roman numerals.
To give something of the flavour of Fibonacci's work we quote [4] the following
theoretical and commercial problems:
PROBLEM 1 (The Lion and the Pit: De leone quite erat in puteo). A pit was 50
handbreadths in depth: A lion climbed up the pit 1/7 handbreadth every day and fell
back 1/9 handbreadth. How long would it take him to get out of the pit?
PROBLEM 2 (Birds and Towers). Two birds start flying from the tops of two
towers 50 feet apart, one 30 feet high, the other 40 feet high, starting at the same
time and at the same rate. They reach the center of a fountain between the towers
at the same time. How far is the fountain from each tower?
PROBLEM 4 (An Inheritance). A man whose end was approaching summoned his
sons and said: "Divide my money as I shall prescribe." To his eldest son, he said,
"You are to have 1 bezant and a seventh of what is left." To his second son he
said, "Take 2 bezants and a seventh of what remains." To the third son, "You are
to take 3 bezants and a seventh of what is left." Thus he gave each son 1 bezant
more than the previous son and a seventh of what remained, and to the last son all
that was left. After following their father's instructions with care, the sons found
that they had shared their inheritance equally. How many sons were there, and
how large was the estate?
seven old women went to Rome; each woman had seven mules; each mule
carried seven sacks; each sack contained seven loaves; and with each loaf were
seven knives; each knife was put in seven sheaths.
(This is reminiscent of the childhood jingle: "As I was going to St. Ives, I met a
man with seven wives, . . . ".)
(i) Find a number which is divisible by 7 and which gives a remainder of 1 when
divided by 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6.
In Chapter 12 of the Liber Abbaci (pages 283-4 of [2]), Fibonacci states the
problem which involves the famous sequence with which his name is irrevocably
linked (Quot paria coniculorum in uno anno ex uno paro germinentur):
A certain man put a pair of rabbits in a place surrounded by a wall. How many
pairs of rabbits can be produced from that pair in a year if it is supposed that
every month each pair begets a new pair which from the second month on
becomes productive?
Since Fibonacci's time his sequence (which was not important to him) has
generated nearly as many research papers as it has hypothetical rabbits! For the
history of the work on the sequence until about 1920 we might consult Dickson
[1]. Since the foundation of the Fibonacci Association in San José, California, in
the 1960's, and the production of the Fibonacci Quarterly (a journal devoted to the
study in integers with special properties) there has been an orgy of creativity in
which this author has shamelessly participated.
7. Liber Quadratorum.
Dedicated to Frederick II (§3), this brilliant book was written by Fibonacci after
his Liber Abbaci. In it, Fibonacci shows his mathematical prowess in solving
Diophantine problems (named after Diophantus, the fourth century A.D.Greek
scholar who lived in Alexandria). His problems involve second degree equations in
two or more unknowns, the solutions for which are required to be given as
integers or rational numbers. Such problems are not easy, particularly when one
wishes to generalise solutions and when the algebraic symbolism Fibonacci needed
was not at his disposal.
The Liber Quadratorum, a book with less immediate influence and narrower
scope than the Liber abaci, was nevertheless an even greater masterpiece, more
original and involving subtler reasoning, a systematically arranged, well-conceived
collection of theorems many of them written by Leonard [Fibonacci], others
discovered from Indian or Arabic sources, but using proofs which were the product
of Leonard's own ingenuity.
It is claimed [13] (5*) that this last result should be called "Leonardo's
Theorem" as it was not definitely stated in any earlier work. Results (ii) and (iii)
are attributed by Proclus to Pythagoras and Plato respectively.
McClenon [13] remarks that Fibonacci's proof of this is "so very ingenious and
original" but long and that "It is not too much to say that this is the finest piece of
reasoning in number theory of which we have any record, before the time of
Fermat".
The following problems of Fibonacci are left to the reader (see [13] for others):
x2 + x = u2, x2 - x = v2.
And not only can three numbers be found in many ways by this method but
also four can be found by means of four square numbers, two of which in order, or
three, or all four added together make a square number . . . I found these four
numbers, the first of which is 1295, the second 4566 6/7, the third 11417 1/2, and
the fourth 79920.
The MS of Liber Quadratorum ceases fairly abruptly at this point. The rest is
silence.
In this short work (the title of which might suggest that algebra is the "flower of
Mathematics"), Fibonacci describes inter alia two of the Diophantine problems he
worked on at the court of the Emperor Frederick (§3). These are, in our phrasing:
PROBLEM 10. Three men owned some money, their shares being 1/2, 1/3, and
1/6. Each took some money at random until none was left. The first man then
returned 1/2 of what he had taken, the second 1/3 and the third 1/6. When the
money now in the pile was divided equally among the men, each possessed what
he was entitled to. How much money was in the original store, and how much did
each man take?
This substantial, well-written book (with its rigorous proofs) contains several
chapters of mainly Euclidean theorems which represent "a considerable advance
over the Geometry of
Boethius and Gerbert (Pope
Sylvester II)" [4].
THE IMPORTANCE OF
FIBONACCI
From Fibonacci's
commercial problems we can
learn much about the society
in which he lived. For
instance, the sociologist and
economist can discover that
pepper was a very important
item of merchandise
transported by Pisan ships,
and that the Pisan colony in
Constantinople traded
extensively with Egypt.
Further evidence is also
gleaned about the relative
values of money coined in the
mints of different cities, and
about the problem of alloying of coins to be minted.
After Fibonacci's death, his influence languished for many centuries and indeed
Mathematics made no real progress for 300 years.
Apart from the statue to his memory in the Giardino Scotto [it was formerly
there; see above for the present location], Fibonacci's name is perpetuated in two
streets, the quayside Lungarno Fibonacci in Pisa and the Via Fibonacci in Florence.
Few people know of these minor memorials.
Strangely, Fibonacci is best remembered by the sequence which bears his name
but which, ironically, he treated only lightly. Modern mathematicians, in naming an
Association, a Journal, and a Bibliographical and Research Centre after Fibonacci,
ensure that his name will not easily be forgotten.
Shannon, A. G., and Horadam, A. F., "Generating Functions for Powers of Third
Order Recurrence Sequences", Duke Mathematical Journall, Vol. 38, No. 4, Dec.
1971, pp. 791-794;
Subba Rao, K., "Some Properties of Fibonacci Numbers - I", Bulletin of Calcutta
Mathematical Society, Vol. 46, No. 4, 1954, pp. 253-257.
As has been truly said [4] of Fibonacci, he is "one of the world's great
intellectual pioneers". Further, Boyer, in A History of Mathematics, appropriately
assesses Fibonacci's capability in these words: "It is true that he was without a
worthy rival during the 900 years of medieval European culture".
A generation wiser than his own (or ours) with a deeper sense of enduring
values may have been bestowed on him the accolade: Stupor Mundi.
FOOTNOTES
(2) Public problem-solving mathematical contests have been known. One such
"tournament" occurred in 1535 between Antonio Maria Fior from Venice and
Niccolo Tartaglia from Brescia, which was won easily by Tartaglia.
(3) Preceding the dedication is the Latin introductory heading: Incipit liber Abaci
Compositus a leonardo filio Bonacij Pisano In Anno, MCCVIII .
(4) This 1228 edition (the only complete printed edition) is one printed by
Baldassarre Boncompagni [2] in Rome in the period 1857-1862. While
Boncompagni knew of the existence of six manuscripts containing Fibonacci's
autobiography, he based his edition on only one manuscript, "the handsome but
frequently badly faded Coventi Soppressi C.I. 2616, dated to the early fourteenth
century" [5]. This manuscript is now located in the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale
in Florence. Translation of Fibonacci's "spare Latinity" is made difficult by slight
variations in the 6 manuscripts (which Grimm in his translation collated) and by the
fact that Fibonacci wrote 13th century Tuscan Latin.
(5) This claim is also made on p.233 of Gino Loria's Storia delle Matematiche,
1950. However, Carl Boyer, on p.283 of A History of Mathematics, 1968, asserts
that these identities "had appeared in Diophantus and had been widely used by the
Arabs. Fibonacci, in some of his problems and methods, seems to follow the Arabs
closely". In Book III Problem 19 of his Arithmetica ("To find four numbers such
that the square of their sum plus or minus any one singly gives a square"),
Diophantus does assume a knowledge of these identities in the special case he
deals with. See the comments on pages 105-106 in T. L. Heath's Diophantus of
Alexandria, 1964. Fibonacci appears to have been generally influenced by the Arab
mathematicians, al-Karkhi and al-Khowarizmi, who in turn were influenced by
Diophantus.
REFERENCES
[1] Dickson, L. E., History of the Theory of Numbers, Vol. 1, 1952, pp.
393-407.
[4] Gies, Joseph and Gies, Frances, Leonard of Pisa and the New Mathematics
of the Middle Ages, Thomas Y. Crowell, 1969.
[6] Guest, J., "A Variant to Fibonacci's Sequence", A.M.T., Vol. 16, No. 1, 1960,
pp. 11-15.
[7] Hoggatt, V. E., Fibonacci and Lucas Numbers, Houghton Mifflin, 1969.
[8] Horadam, A. F., "Pythagorean Numbers and Fibonacci Sequences", A.M.T.,
Vol. 17, No. 2, July 1961, pp. 32-35.
[9] Horadam, A. F., "Fibonacci and his wonderful numbers", A.M.T., Vol. 19, No.
3, November 1963, pp. 54-60.
[13] McClenon, R. B., "Leonardo of Pisa and his Liber Quadratorum", American
Mathematical Monthly, Vol. 26, No. 1, January 1919, pp. 1-8.