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Archimedes was born in Syracuse, Sicily. He was both a great physicist and a brilliant mathematician. Archimedes wrote many books, including On Plane Equilibriums, On the Sphere and Cylinder, On Spirals, and On Floating Bodies. The last book deals with his physical discoveries on buoyancy, while the others deal with his geometrical discoveries. His most famous discovery is the theorem which gives the weight of an object submerged in a liquid, called Archimedes' principle. This principle states that the weight of an object submerged in a liquid is equal to the weight of the water displaced by the body. Archimedes was killed by Roman soldiers when the Romans invaded Sicily. He is said to have been hard at work on yet another geometrical proof and did not notice the soldiers coming upon him. When they came, he is said to have asked to remain alive for a few more minutes so that he could finish his current work and not leave it incomplete. The soldiers did not honor this request. |