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Ancient India has contributed a lot to the development of mathematics and the part played by the Jaina scholars in this field is very significant. These contributions are far superior to those made by other nations and countries upto the 12th century A. D. or so. In ancient India, Mathematics and Astronomy were given a very high place in the field of knowledge as is evident from the following verse of Vedānga :
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This when translated into English would mean : "As are crests on the heads of peacocks, as are gems on the heads of snakes, so is Mathematics at the top of all sciences-branches of knowledge."
(ii) कल्प
यथा शिखा मयूराणां, नागानां मरणयो यथा 1 तद्वद् वेदाङ्ग शास्त्रारणा, गणितं मूर्धनि स्थितम् ॥
Amongst the six fund unental branches of knowledge, viz.
(i) fareTr
(iii) व्याकरण (iv) निरुक्त
(v) छंद (vi) satfag
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-The Science of proper articulation and pronunciation-phonetics,
-Rules for rituals and ceremonials (śulva-Sutra supplement to Kalpa Sutra),
-The Science of right use of language,
-Etymology (The science of origin of words),
-The Science of prosody (Metronomy),
-Astronomy-the Science of stars and other heavenly bodies,
Astronomy occupies a prominent place as mentioned in another verse : शिक्षा कल्पो व्याकरणं, निरुक्त छन्दसा चैव ! ज्योतिषानयनं चैव, वेदांगानि षडैव तु ॥
In fact all knowledge can be divided into two main streams (i) the science of letters (a faar) (ii) the science of numbers (a far). In the former are included subjects like Grammar, Literature, Logic etc. while in the latter are included Gaņita, Astronomy, Science, Economics, Commerce etc.
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