Thomas Harriot's Translations

Elizabethan mathematician Thomas Harriot pioneered the systematic solution of higher- into lower-order equations through the device of setting them equal to zero. He performed another kind of dimensional translation in developing techniques of spherical trigonometry and projective geometry for navigation. Harriot was also, at the age of 25, given the task of breaking the language barrier between the English and the Algonquian people of what is now coastal North Carolina. This article considers possible connections between Harriot's linguistic and mathematical work.