Cultivated by the ancient Greeks more than two thousand years ago, geometry is one of the oldest intellectual pursuits of man. Its origins can be traced back even farther to the Babylonians and Egyptians. In essence, Egyptian geometry was a simple, empirical art of practical measurement, fostered by the necessity of frequent land-surveying due to inundations by the river Nile, and also by the astronomical curiosity and religious tradition of the Egyptians. Their geometry was, in short, a rule-of-thumb geometry.