Bhāskara
From Hindupedia, the Hindu Encyclopedia
By Jit Majumdar
- creator of light; creator of radiance; illuminator
- the Sun; fire; gold; a sculptor
- a son of Kaśyapa and Aditī (Hari. Pur.); a mathematician of the 7th century CE (known as Bhāskara I) who was the first to conceive of numbers in the Hindu-Arabic decimal system and use a circle as the symbol for the value ‘zero’, and the author of the treatise Mahābhāskariya; a 12th century mathematician and astronomer (known as Bhāskara II) who was the author of the arithmetical treatise Līlāvati, the algebraic treatise Bījaganita, and the treatise of astronomical mathematics Siddhānta Śiromaņi.