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Thanks, Roger. I often wondered how Madeleine L'Engle came up with that name
for her idea.. Or even if she origiinated the concept of wrinkles in time and
tesseracts. She has a way of explaining things that makes you believe she is
describing a real scientific thory. Rather like Asimov and his treatise on
thiotimoline.
Hilary

Roger Buxton wrote:
>
> Hans van der Genugten wrote:
>
> > (What is TESSERACT?)
>
> The word is evidently derived from the Latin 'tessera' (which later
> became 'tessella'), which was a small rectangular piece of wood or stone
> used for making mosaic patterns. The word has become adapted more
> recently into the verb 'tessellate', meaning to 'divide a surface into
> repeating regular shapes' (without any gaps). A branch of mathematics
> has evolved to deal with this issue where, of course, one is not limited
> to merely two or three dimensions.
>
> One of the most imaginative and successful practioners of the art of
> tessellation in recent times was your own countryman Maurits Escher. His
> beautiful illustrations of interlocking fish, birds, dogs, horsemen, and
> other assorted shapes continue to amaze and delight the world. L'emgle's
> idea (as reported by Hilary Blue) is another manifestation of a fertile
> imagination born of geometry.
>
> Roger Buxton