Touring Persia with a Guide Named ... Hermann Weyl

摘要

A journey across the lands that were part of Persia long ago offers a friendly introduction to symmetry and symmetry groups, as presented in Hermann Weyl's seminal and popular book, Symmetry (1952). Weyl's intent was to show how geometrical transformations first, then mathematical structures, could be better understood from a cultural point of view through art and architecture. Our intent is to provide a complementary set of selected pictures of Persian monuments to illustrate Weyl's ideas. Following the master, we have focused on different kinds of symmetries, starting from the simplest and oldest to those that are more complex, disregarding chronology or geography within the lands of Persia.