The new versus the old method of computation as portrayed in an early encyclopaedia, the MARGARITA PHILOSOPHICA (Pearl of Wisdom) of Gregor Reisch (Strassbourg, 1504).
The illustration symbolizes the culmination of a four-hundred year rivalry. The abacists had struggled to retain Roman numerals and the abacus for calculation. The algorists advocated the use of the Hindu-Arabic system, along with its algorithms for calculation, the methods having been popularized in Europe via a 12th century translation of the classic arithmetic textbook of al-Khwârizmî (whose name gave rise to the word algorithm).
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The algorists are represented by the Roman
philosopher and arithmetician
Boethius, who is employing algorithmic methods
to compute with
Hindu-Arabic numerals.
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The central figure in the woodcut, holding books on the two methods of calculation,
is Arithmetica, representing one of
The Seven Liberal
Arts that comprise the university curriculum of medieval times.
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The abacists are
represented by the Greek mathematician
Pythagoras, who is calculating on
a counting-board, whereupon pebbles are pushed along lines (the Latin word
for pebble is calculus).
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By the early 16th century, Western Europe had universally adopted the efficient algorithms.