Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Mathematics/2015 March 29

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March 29

Why are Quadratic Equations called what they are?

Maybe a stupid question, but Simultaneous Equations have two parts you need to solve together to find x, so then wouldn't Quadratic Equations logically be the same thing, but in four parts?

Dehpsycho (talk) 13:03, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

To find the area of a square of side a, you multiply a by itself. That's the reason multiplying a number by itself is called "squaring". A square is a type of quadrilateral, hence words derived from "quad" are also used to describe squaring. A quadratic equation involves squaring the variable, hence the name.

That's off the top of my head, surely there's some historical context I'm missing. -- Meni Rosenfeld (talk) 13:19, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

No, actually, that's the whole story right there. --65.94.50.15 (talk) 17:00, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Yep, see also Quadrature_(mathematics). SemanticMantis (talk) 14:47, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

The latin word for square is QUADRATUM. Bo Jacoby (talk) 18:09, 30 March 2015 (UTC).