In mathematics, particularly in number theory, an indeterminate system has fewer equations than unknowns but an additional a set of constraints on the unknowns, such as restrictions that the values be integers. In modern times indeterminate equations are often called Diophantine equations.
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Indeterminate equation in the context of Bachet
Claude Gaspar Bachet Sieur de Méziriac (9 October 1581 – 26 February 1638) was a French mathematician and poet born in Bourg-en-Bresse, at that time belonging to Duchy of Savoy. He wrote Problèmes plaisans et délectables qui se font par les nombres, Les éléments arithmétiques, and a Latin translation of the Arithmetica of Diophantus (the very translation where Fermat wrote a margin note about Fermat's Last Theorem). He also discovered means of solving indeterminate equations using continued fractions, a method of constructing magic squares, and a proof of Bézout's identity.
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