Oresme provided a geometrical verification for the generalized Merton rule, which we would express today as s = 1 2 ( v 0 + v f ) t (i.e., distance traveled is equal to one half of the sum of the initial v 0 and final v f velocities, multiplied by the elapsed time t ), by finding the area of a trapezoid. Clay tablets used in Babylonian astronomy (350–50 BC) present trapezoid procedures for computing Jupiter's position and motion and anticipate the theorem by 14 centuries.