Applications of Mathematics to Everyday Life in Spanish Arithmetic Books Published in the 16th Century

Abstract This paper shows a study about some mathematics books written in Spanish and published during the 16th century. All the examples included in these books and their relations with daily situations from that time have been identified and categorized. In order to do that, we made an historical-mathematical analysis supported by the content analysis technique of textbooks, widely used by authors in researches related to the history of mathematics and mathematics education. In general, all the books included in this study present many similarities. The analysis has highlighted the large number of examples included in each book even though most of them are related to trade and to common situations of accountants and businessmen of that century.