A Generalization of Archimedes’ Theorem on the Area of a Parabolic Segment

Abstract

Abstract Archimedes’ well known theorem on the area of a parabolic segment says that this area is 4/3 of the area of a certain inscribed triangle. In this paper we generalize this theorem to the n-dimensional euclidean space, n ≥ 3. It appears that the ratio of the volume of an n-dimensional solid bounded by an (n − 1)-dimensional hyper-paraboloid and an (n − 1)-dimensional hyperplane and the volume of a certain inscribed cone (we analogously repeat Archimedes’ procedure) depends only on the dimension of the euclidean space and it equals to 2n/(n +1).