Pythagorean theorem four elementary lemmata: Next, each top square is related to a triangle congruent with another triangle related in turn to one of two rectangles making up the lower square. The proof is as follows: This proof, which appears in Euclid's "Elements" as that of Proposition 47 in Book 1, demonstrates that the area of the square on the hypotenuse is the sum of the areas of the other two squares. This is quite distinct from the proof by similarity of triangles, which is conjectured to be the proof that Pythagoras used. We have already discussed the Pythagorean proof, which was
Pappus's area theorem rather than only for right angled ones and secondly it uses parallelograms rather than squares. For squares on two sides of an arbitrary triangle it yields a parallelogram of equal area over the third side and if the two sides are the legs of a right angle the parallelogram over the third side will be square as well. For a right-angled triangle, two parallelograms attached to the legs of the right angle yield a rectangle of equal area on the third side and again if the two parallelograms are squares then the rectangle on the third side will be a