Aryabhata completes the Aryabhatiya
- Date
- 499 CE
- Category
- Science, technology & invention
- Region
- Northern India (Kusumapura, near Pataliputra)
- Era
- Classical Antiquity
- Significance
In 499 CE the astronomer-mathematician Aryabhata, working at Kusumapura (near Pataliputra) during the Gupta era, completed the Aryabhatiya, a concise verse treatise of 121 stanzas that became a foundation of classical Indian mathematics and astronomy.
Drawing on the mature decimal place-value system, the work presents arithmetic, algebra, an accurate value of pi (3.1416), and a remarkably precise table of sine (jya) differences that founded Indian trigonometry. In astronomy Aryabhata asserted that the Earth rotates on its axis — explaining the apparent daily motion of the stars — gave correct physical accounts of solar and lunar eclipses as shadow phenomena, and computed the length of the sidereal year to within minutes of the modern value. The Aryabhatiya was studied, commented upon and transmitted for over a millennium, influencing later Indian astronomers and, through Arabic translation, Islamic and ultimately European science. It stands as a defining intellectual monument of the Gupta 'Golden Age' and of India's contribution to the exact sciences.
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Empires active in 499 CE
- Sassanid Empire224 CE – 651 CE
- Kingdom of Funan50 CE – 550 CE
- Byzantine Empire330 CE – 1453 CE
- Hephthalite Empire440 CE – 560 CE
- Kingdom of Aksum100 CE – 940 CE
- Gupta Empire320 CE – 550 CE
Related science, technology & invention events
- Cai Lun standardises papermaking105 CE
- The Bakhshali manuscript and the earliest recorded zeroc. 224–383 CE (carbon-dated)
- Ptolemy completes the Almagestc. 150 CE
- Zhang Heng invents the seismoscope132 CE
- Compilation of the Charaka Samhita and the Codification of Ayurvedac. 100 CE
- Inauguration of the Colosseum (Flavian Amphitheatre)80 CE
Further reading
The wider story
A Little History of Science
Warm, jargon-free tour of discovery from Babylonian stargazers to the genome.
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