Madhava - Definition and Overview

Madhava is another name for Vishnu and appears as the 72nd, 167th and 735th names in the Vishnu sahasranama.

• According to Adi Sankara' s commentary on the Vishnu sahasranama, Madhava means the consort of Ma, or Mahalaksmi, the Mother of the universe. Alternatively, it means on who is fit to be known through Madhu-vidya or can mean One who is the Lord of "Ma" or knowledge.

Additionally, it means One who was born in the clan of Madhu. Reference: Cited from Sri Vishnu Sahasranama, commentary by Sri Sankaracharya, trasnlated by Swami Tapasyananda, available at Sri Ramakrishna Math, Chennai. available at India web site: http://www.sriramakrishnamath.org and US site: http://www.vedanta.com.

Madhava (माधव) of Sangamagrama (1350-1425) was a major mathematician of the Kerala school who is considered the father of mathematical analysis for having taken the decisive step from the finite procedures of ancient mathematics to treat their limit-passage to infinity, which is the kernel of modern classical analysis.

Using his techniques, he gave a value of the number pi:3.1415926359

See also

• Indian mathematicians

External link

• Madhava's mathematical contributions (http://www-gap.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Madhava.html)