Euclidean tilings by convex regular polygons

Euclidean plane tilings by convex regular polygons have been widely used since antiquity. The first systematic mathematical treatment was that of Kepler in his Harmonices Mundi (Latin: The Harmony of the World, 1619).

Regular tilings

Following Grünbaum and Shephard (section 1.3), a tiling is said to be regular if the symmetry group of the tiling acts transitively on the flags of the tiling, where a flag is a triple consisting of a mutually incident vertex, edge and tile of the tiling. This means that for every pair of flags there is a symmetry operation mapping the first flag to the second. This is equivalent to the tiling being an edge-to-edge tiling by congruent regular polygons. There must be six equilateral triangles, four squares or three regular hexagons at a vertex, yielding the three regular tessellations.

Archimedean, uniform or semiregular tilings

Vertex-transitivity means that for every pair of vertices there is a symmetry operation mapping the first vertex to the second.