Algorithms Have Been Around for 4,000 Years

A basic concept of computer science is the algorithm. The technical term is named after the Persian mathematician Muhammad Ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi, author of a work on calculation rules (who lived around 780 to 850 AD). Examples from everyday life are recipes, handicraft instructions, rules of the game, instructions for use, score, pattern. The first known written algorithms were created around 2000 BC in Mesopotamia (see Donald E. Knuth; Luis Trabb Pardo: The early development of programming languages, in: Donald E. Knuth (ed.): A widespread calculation method is recorded in the Papyrus Rhind (around 1550 B.C.): Egyptian multiplication.