fl. c. 750 B.C.

Indian priest and author of one of the Sulbasutras, early Hindu mathematical texts. Mathematics in ancient India primarily served the purposes of priestly rites, and Manava's Sulbasutra concerns accurate construction of altars for making sacrifices. Long before Greek mathematicians began trying to square the circle, the Manava Sulbasutra offered information on converting squares or rectangles to circles. Among the various values for π given in the text was the figure of 25/8 or 3.125.