In Chhandah-shastra, a Sansrit book on meters, or long syllables, "Pingala presents the first known description of a binary numeral system. He described the binary numeral system in connection with the listing of Vedic meters with short and long syllables. His work also contains the basic ideas of maatraameru (Fibonacci number) and meruprastaara (Pascal's triangle.)"

By the time of Herodotus the Persian Royal Road runs some 2,857 km from the city of Susa on the lower Tigris to the port of Smyrna (modern Izmir in Turkey) on the Aegean Sea. The Royal Road is a highway built by the Persian king Darius I. Darius built the road to facilitate rapid communication throughout his very large empire. The road will be protected by Persian rulers and later used by the Romans. On this road couriers can travel 1,677 miles (2,699 km) in seven or nine days. Herodotus wrote, "There is nothing in the world that travels faster than these Persian couriers." Herodotus' praise for these messengers — "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness of night prevents them from accomplishing the task proposed to them with the very utmost speed" — is the inspiration for the unofficial motto of postal carriers. By having fresh horses and riders ready at each relay, royal couriers can carry messages the entire distance in 9 days, though normal travellers take about three months. This Royal Road links into many other routes in the overall trade network known as the Silk Road. Some of these, such as the routes to India and Central Asia, are also protected, encouraging regular contact between India, Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean. There are accounts in the Old Testament book of Esther of dispatches being sent from Susa to provinces as far out as India and Cush during the reign of Xerxes (485-465 BC).

Until the development of optical telegraph systems at the end of the 18th century, messengers on horseback riding over a good road system will remain the fastest method of sending a message overland.

The library of Aristotle may be the first private library concerning which there is considerable discussion among early commentators. It is impossible to know how much of the discussion has basis in fact. Harris provides the following summary: "Upon his [Aristotle's] death, this library was inherited by Aristotle's teaching successor, Theorphrastus of Lesbos. . . .Theophrastus in turn enlarged the library and later bequeathed it to his nephew Neleus. Neleus was not a successful teacher, and in his later years withdrew from the school, taking his library with him to Scepsis in Asia Minor. His descendants, apparently unlettered but aware of the value of the books, saved them by burying them, according to the geographer Strabo, to keep them out of the hands of the Attalid kings of Pergamum who were building up their famous library.

"Finally, about 100 B.C., the mildewed and worm-eaten remnants of Aristotle's library were sold to Appellicon of Teos, a minor Athenian military leader and book collector. Apellicon tried to restore the damaged volumes but only succeeded in damaging them further when he made incorrect 'corrections' for missing fragments of pages and otherwise edited the works. After his death, Athens was captured by the Roman general Sulla, who carred the library off to Rome, where it eventually became a part of Tyrannion's library. Another account relates that Ptolemy II (285-246 B.C.) acquired Aristotle's library directly from Neleus and brought it to Egypt to become a part of the great Alexandrian library. It is possible that both stories are apartially correct, and it is quite probable that copies at least of Aristotle's library reached Alexandria eventually. " (Harris, History of Libraries in the Western World 4th ed. [1999] 40-41)