User:Francis Schonken/Arabic numerals


 * I started this page on 17:46, 24 December 2005 (UTC) to try out an alternative intro for the Arabic numerals/Hindu-Arabic numerals page --Francis Schonken

What in the Western world is best known as Arabic numerals - or with respect to its history also Hindu-Arabic or Indo-Arabic numerals - has two main aspects:
 * 1) A base ten numeral system with unclear origin, as it hasn't been established univocally who was the first to use a symbol for zero as a number in a base ten positional system, so that numerals could be composed with it, neither has it been established univocally who learnt what from whom in setting up the base ten numeral system in the form it was known since the Renaissance. The present best guess regarding the origin of the base ten numeral system: somewhere in or around the first millennium AD, somewhere between Europe and India, but, for example, as late as the end of the 16th century Simon Stevin was (re-)inventing the notation of decimal fractions (see Simon Stevin), that is some four centuries after the numerals had become widely spread in Europe, thanks to, among others, Fibonacci's ''Liber Abaci.
 * 2) A set of symbols for the graphic representation of the digits:
 * Western notation: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 - going back to the ancient Hindu representation, see Brahmi numerals;
 * Arabic notation: &#x660; - &#x661; - &#x662; - &#x663; - &#x664; - &#x665; - &#x666; - &#x667; - &#x668; - &#x669; (read right to left)
 * etc...

Hindu-Arabic numerals may also be referred to as Hindu numerals, Indian numerals, Western numerals, European numerals,... - such names usually also imply a graphic representation format for the symbols.

In the Western world the term Arabic became associated with these numerals as a result of Europeans learning about them via, among others, Arabs.

History
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Base ten numeral system
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Symbol sets
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