Won-wang

views updated

Won-wang

1182-1135 b.c.

Chinese mystic and author of the I-king or I-ching, which includes some mathematical information. The book discusses the magic square, a matrix in which the sum of all figures added along any straight line is the same. The magic square, which the text attributes to the semi-legendary Emperor Yu (c. 2200 b.c.), is in turn related to the faces of a die.

More From encyclopedia.com