NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: Brad Morris
Date: 2019 Nov 26, 10:52 -0500
The following problem appeared in the Imperial College Alumni Magazine, Imperial/47. It’s graded as ‘Fiendish’, but the easiest solution, when you spot it, is remarkably simple. My own attempts were a bit longer. My DaveP
A medieval farmer is in their house and needs to get water from a river and then take the water to animals in a barn. The farmer would like to take the shortest route to the barn but doesn’t know about calculus (as it hadn’t been invented). The farmers house is 400yards west of the river, which runs north-south, and the barn is 200 yards west of the river but 800 yards further north than the house. How can the farmer work out the shortest path, and how long will that path be?
No clues here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XgMxKP_Jcs