Subject: Polygons

From: Manuel

Elementary level (6th Grade)
Student Question

What do you call a 13 sided polygon?
Is there a list of the different names?

Thank you for your help.

Hi Manuel

There seems to be an "official"set of names for polygons, uniformly derived from the Greek (after 4 sides).

Number of sidesName
3
triangle or trigon
4
quadrilateral or tetragon
5
pentagon
6
hexagon
7
heptagon
8
octagon
9
enneagon
10
decagon
11
hendecagon
12
dodecagon
13
triskaidecagon or tridecagon
14
tetrakaidecagon or tetradecagon
15
pendedecagon
16
hexdecagon
17
heptdecagon
18
octdecagon
19
enneadecagon
20
icosagon
After about 6 sides mathematicians usually refer to these polygons as n-gons. So your 13 sided polygon I would call a 13-gon.

Cheers,
Walter and Harley

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