Abstract
To write “sun”, “moon” and “tree” in picture-writing, one draws simply a circle, a crescent and some simplified, conventionalized picture of a tree, respectively. Picture-writing was used by some tribes of red Indians and it may well be that more advanced systems of writing evolved everywhere from this primitive system. And so picture-writing may be the ultimate source of the Greek, Latin and Gothic alphabets, the letters of which we currently use as mathematical symbols. I wish to observe that also the primitive picture-writing may be of some use in mathematics.
*Address presented at the meeting of the Association in Athens, Ga., March 16, 1956.
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References
G. Pólya and G. Szegö, Aufgaben und Lehrsätze aus der Analysis, 2 volumes, Berlin, 1925.
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Polya, G. (2009). On Picture-Writing*. In: Gessel, I., Rota, GC. (eds) Classic Papers in Combinatorics. Modern Birkhäuser Classics. Birkhäuser Boston. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-8176-4842-8_16
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-8176-4842-8_16
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