Bronze and Iron AgesScience & Math Babylonian mathematics c. 1,800 BCEMajor Tablets like Plimpton 322 show advanced base-60 math. We still use it in 60-minute hours and 360-degree circles. ▲ MattersSaveShareTrace roots Longest chain: The Big Bang → First stars ignite → Supernovae seed heavy elements → The Sun forms → Earth forms → First oceans → First life → Photosynthesis evolves → Great Oxidation Event → Complex cells (eukaryotes) → Multicellular life → First animals → Cambrian Explosion → First vertebrates → Jawed fish → Fish walk onto land → The amniotic egg → The Great Dying → Dinosaurs appear → Asteroid ends the dinosaurs → Early primates → Apes split from monkeys → Human line splits from chimpanzees → Walking upright → First stone tools → Genus Homo appears → Homo erectus → Control of fire → Habitual fire and cooking → Homo sapiens appears → Complex language → Natufian villages → Oldest known bread → Agriculture begins → Irrigation → Uruk and the first cities → Cylinder seals → Writing (cuneiform) → Babylonian mathematics Community notesLoading notes… Learn more ranked by votesDocumentbritannica.comMathematics in ancient Mesopotamia (Britannica) ↗Editor's pickBookEleanor RobsonMathematics in Ancient Iraq: A Social History ↗Editor's pickVideoSearch on YouTubeBabylonian mathematics base 60 Plimpton 322 ↗Editor's pick