New proofs of certain characterisations of cyclic circumscriptible quadrilaterals

Abstract

A convex quadrilateral ABCD is called circumscriptible or tangential if it admits an incircle, i.e. a circle that touches all of its sides. A typical circumscriptible quadrilateral is depicted in Figure 1, where the incircle of ABCD touches the sides at, Aʹ, Bʹ, Cʹ and Dʹ. Notice that labellings such as AAʹ = ADʹ = a are justified by the fact that two tangents from a point to a circle have equal lengths (a, b, c and d in Figure 1 are called tangent lengths). This simple fact also implies that if x, y, and z are the angles shown in the figure, then x = y. In fact, if AD and BC are parallel, then x = y = 90°. Otherwise, the extensions of AD and BC would meet, say at Q, with QDʹ. Hence x = y. Thus x = y in all cases, and sin x = sin y = sin z. We shall use this observation freely. Also we shall denote the vertices and vertex angles of a polygon by the same letters, but after making sure that no confusion may arise.