Pythagoras triangle the square of the hypotenuse is equal [to the sum of] the squares of the two other sides"—that is, formula_1. According to a popular legend, after he discovered this theorem, Pythagoras sacrificed an ox, or possibly even a whole "hecatomb", to the gods. Cicero rejected this story as spurious because of the much more widely held belief that Pythagoras forbade blood sacrifices. Porphyry attempted to explain the story by asserting that the ox was actually made of dough. The Pythagorean theorem was known and used by the Babylonians and Indians centuries before Pythagoras, but it is possible that he
Fermat's right triangle theorem and the other is odd. Therefore, both formula_39 and formula_40 are even, one of which is divisible by 4. From these two numbers Fermat derives two more numbers formula_41 and formula_42, one of which is even by the previous sentence. Because formula_43 is a square, formula_44 and formula_45 are the legs of another primitive Pythagorean triangle whose area formula_46. Since formula_27 is itself a square and since formula_48 is even, formula_49 is a square. Thus, any Pythagorean triangle with square area leads to a smaller Pythagorean triangle with square area, completing the proof. Fermat's right triangle theorem Fermat's right triangle