The $2 Million Lost Book of Archimedes

A prayer book holding hidden text reveals long-buried secrets from the greatest mathematician of the ancient world.

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Special thank you to Steven Strogatz and Amir Alexander for lending their time and expertise! I highly recommend both of their books that cover ideas discussed here:

(these are NOT affiliate links. Support local bookstores!)
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Much of the story told here, as well as quite a bit of additional information not covered in this video, can be found in this excellent book:

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Credits:

Written and Produced by Ben Syversen
Illustrations: Kendall Eddy
Editing: Ben Syversen, Pranav Kumar
Animation: Ben Syversen, Alex Zepherin
Camera and sound for A-roll footage: Anthony Forma and Mike Karas
Thumbnail design: Mostafa Hasan and Ben Syversen

Music: Epidemic Sound

Also thank you to Gary Rubinstein and Viktor Blåsjö, who both offered helpful feedback while I was writing this script.
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Chapters:
00:00 - Intro
01:35 - The Method (The Basics)
08:18 - Archimedes
10:33 - The Dark Ages
12:48 - Brilliant
14:02 - The Method (Parabola)
20:37 - The Scribe
21:31 - Renaissance
26:35 - Discovered
29:33 - Lost
31:51 - Found
35:46 - New Discoveries
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A few helpful Archimedes resources:

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Other books shown on screen:

Torricelli - Opera Geometrica - Courtesy of The Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering & Technology - Creative Commons License CC by 4.0.

The Works of Archimedes (English translation from Heiberg’s German editions) - Edited by T.L. Heath, originally published 1897 by Cambridge University Press

Images: public domain via Wikimedia and Metropolitan Museum of Art

Other images via Wikimedia Commons:
Isidore of Meletus: © Hubertl / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0
Hagia Sophia: via Wikimedia Commons
Mar Saba (Photo by Jean & Nathalie, 2011).jpg - via Wikimedia Commons
Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1994-036-09A / CC-BY-SA - via Wikimedia Commons
Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-1985-1216-509 / CC-BY-SA 3.0- via Wikimedia Commons
Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-2008-0710-500 / CC-BY-SA 3.0 - via Wikimedia Commons
Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-L05487 / CC-BY-SA 3.0 - via Wikimedia Commons
Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-N0827-318 / CC-BY-SA 3.0 - via Wikimedia Commons

This video was sponsored by Brilliant

Corrections:
31:51 - Pronounced "Noll," like the first name

[bensyversen]

CORRECTION: William Noel's name is pronounced closer to "Noll" - like the first time. My sincere apologies for mispronouncing it in this video.

[PhilThurston]

Kudos has also to be given to the anonymous buyer who offered up his treasure to science for the benefit of future generations. Thank you.

[DanielKRui]

What an amazing mind Archimedes had. Creativity so potent that even 2200 years later, the delightful sparkle of his ideas has not dulled one iota

[UCsktlulEBEebvBBOuDQ]

You'd think the anonymous buyer was the vilain for fighting to give it back but he graciously give it to the science people to extract the data !

[rajaparameswaran]

A man born early for the time and isolated in an Island, but his genius codex survived through 2 Millenia and worth $2 Million. Thanks for bringing it to light, so beautifully.

[rhiannonwi]

This really helped me understand the importance of the codex. Will Noel is much missed by his friends. A joy to hear his voice again.

[adolftittler]

Hands down the best documentary I have seen this year, simply phenomenal work

[Andrew-rcvh]

That's a brilliant job of producing a documentary. It's one of the best I have seen. Well done.

[peteradams]

You need to read up about how many libraries and book were destroyed when Constantinople fell and how painfully few survived. The joke was that so many books were tossed into the Bosphorus that you could walk across the river.

[Astroponicist]

Good night Arhimedes of Syracuse, & our sincere thanks that you thought to preserve your work for us.

[renerpho]

I was very sad when I learned that Noel had passed away! His work on the Archimedes palimpsest was amazing. RIP

[peterboneg]

Calculus was finally made much more rigorous in the 19th century when infinitesimals were replaced with the theory of limits. Finally mathematicians understood why infinitesimals often worked but sometimes didn't.

[sathsycs]

What a gem of a video. 💎This is seriously one of the best documentaries I have ever seen. Sad to hear of William Noel's passing. Still coming back to this video every now and then to revisit this masterpiece! Definitely sharing this video with my friends and your channel.
Happily subscribed to this channel! Keep it up! 😃

[caribbeanchannel]

Best documentary I've seen in a long time. And it's also updated from what I heard about this book before.

[HypnoPol]

Not a mathematician, so did not understand the maths, even though the animations were brilliant, I loved every minute,

[cnpeters]

Holy wow. I obviously have an interest in recreational math and history - but I have no idea how this found its way to my recommendations when all I’ve done is watch college football and cooking videos for the last few months.

But I’m so grateful it did. This is amazing work.

[joebobku]

This method makes perfect sense for the time. You weighed all things on a scale at the time. He likely never weighed imaginary items until he proved it with real world materials. You move those items on a scale until they balanced.

[lostsierraforrest]

Astonishing. And I learned something new: the stomachion. Never heard about this thing before, but I have known about combinatorics for some years now. By the way, I'm seventy and enjoy mathematics more than ever because it helps to keep my brain stimulated. I was decrepit in math in my primary school years but came to learn algebra and calculus in my mid-twenties and through my early thirties by first joining the Navy and then going to college. In the Navy I was an electronics technician so during schooling for that I had to learn basic algebra and trigonometry; calculus came later because I was striving to become a mechanical engineer, although I never achieved that. Doesn't matter. These days I just enjoy watching great videos like this one and being an armchair math student.

[captain]

I hope that many will flock to this video in time

Edit: Amir Alexander! I love the infinitesimal book he made.

[xHyperElectric]

This was a fantastic video. One of the most interesting things I have ever heard of. Amazing job communicating all of these complex ideas and stories in such a digestible way!