Wednesday, November 8, 2017

mathematics - A tale of The Rich Arab man


A tale of The Rich Arab man.


There was a rich Arab man who had four wives. One day he decided to give away all his diamonds to all of his wives.


He carried all his diamonds in a huge bag, walked into the house of his most favorite wife and told her about his intention.


This lady, a fair and understanding woman, counted the diamonds and took a quarter for herself and returned the remaining diamonds to her husband to be shared among the other wives.


He walked into the house of his next most favorite wife, told her his intention but he didn't tell her his most favourite wife had already taken her share. She counted exactly one quarter of the sum and returned the balance to the man to be shared among the other three wives.


The same thing happened with the other two wives too.



Walking out from the last house, he found the remaining quantity of diamonds was exactly divisible by four. He split the sum into four equal parts and gave it to the wives separately.


How many diamonds (the smallest number) was the Arab man carrying initially?



Answer




10 to begin with.

10/4 = 2 so wife 1 gets 2 diamonds with 8 left over.
8/4 = 2 so wife 2 also gets 2 diamonds with 6 left over.
6/4 = 1 so wife 3 gets just 1 diamond - 5 now remain.
5/4 = 1 so wife 4 also gets 1 diamond.
4 now remain - give 1 to each of the four wives.




The man had



10 diamonds.



However -



all were fakes.



He now has




10 pieces of glass and 4 angry wives.



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