Indian Mathematics c8.8

c8.8

The first mention of special terms to represent unknown quantities occurs in Bhāskara's *Vīja-gaṇita* which was written in the twelfth century of our era. Bhāskara says: "As many as (*yāvat tāvat*) and the colours 'black (*kālaka*), blue (*nīlaka*), yellow (*pītaka*) and red (*lohitaka*)' and others besides these have been selected by ancient teachers[^asterisk] for names of values of unknown quantities."