"I have discovered a truly remarkable proof but this margin is too small to contain it," Pierre de Fermat famously wrote on margin of his copy of the Arithmetica by Diophantus of Alexandria back in 1637. The proof the French mathematician and lawyer was referring to was for his theorem in which he states that no three positive integers x, y, and z can satisfy the equation xn + yn = zn where n is an integer greater than two.
Fermat's Last Theorem, also called Fermat's great theorem, was his best known work and to commemorate the 410th birth anniversary of the founder of the modern theory of numbers Google has put up a doodle inspired by the theorem. Instead of a copy of theArithmetica, the Google doodle uses a blackboard with a faintly erased Google logo and the theorem written in chalk.
Google also does a little spin-off on Fermat's famous words and notes in the alt text of the doodle (that is readable when a user hovers the cursor over the image) "I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of this theorem, which this doodle is too small to contain.
Pierre de Fermat was born on August 17, 1601 to a wealthy French businessman. There is little information about his early education, but he is believed to have studied law at Toulouse and Bordeaux. He developed an interest in languages, literature, science and mathematics. After receiving a degree in law from the University of Orleans in 1631 he started his legal career and a few years later changed his name from Pierre Fermat to Pierre de Fermat.
Because Ferment did not spread his work through books and journals and he often did not provide any proof for his theorems he was referred to as an 'amateur' mathematician, but that the same time Fermet is also considered to be one of the two (the other being Rene Descartes) leading mathematicians of the first half of the 17th century.
A French postage stamp on Pierre de Fermat's 400th birth anniversary
Pierre de Fermat died at the age of 63 on January 12, 1665 at Castres, France.
Google doodles have gained immense popularity over the past few years and the Google team has put out commemorative doodles on events ranging from news events, civic milestones, birthdays, death anniversaries and important dates in history.
Google estimates it has created more than 900 doodles since 1998, with 270 of them running in 2010.
