Number Story

Keith Pickersgillleft a comment

Hopefuly this will be the last part: It is web articles like this and people forwarding various versions via email to all their friends without first checking the facts, that lead to disinformation and mis-education. Check your facts before publishing anything on the web, or forwarding powerpoint presentations to your friends!

Keith Pickersgillleft a comment

and more... ... and you have a 4 with the new diagonal added to join the original two lines. Read this Wikipedia for the TRUE story: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_n... I quote from the above page: "Despite evidence to the contrary, some folkloric explanations for the origin of modern Arabic numerals persist. While these hypotheses continue to propagate due to their seemingly well

Keith Pickersgillleft a comment

FFS! Here is the rest... read below first... This happened because writing instruments, as well as paper, improved to the point where people could write much faster, and then did not lift the pen between strokes (or created new, lighter strokes between the heavier original strokes). The original Four looked like today's + symbol. Draw a + without lifting your pen, and you have a 4 with the new di

Keith Pickersgillleft a comment

Once again they trimmed the end off, so read brom the earlier posts up towards this one... ...the modern 2 (which originally looked more like a Z but became curved to avoid confusion with the letter Z)... the three horizontal lines eventually acquired two diagonal lines to join all three together to become our modern 3. This happened because writing instruments, as well as paper, improved to the p

Keith Pickersgillleft a comment

Wy do they trim our comments? OK, here is the rest of it... One was originally written as a single HORIZONTAL line... Two, as TWO HORIZONTAL LINES, one above the other. Three, as THREE HORIZONTAL lines, one above the other... the 1 was eventually turned vertical. the two horizontal lines, were eventually joined by a diagonal line to become the modern 2 (which originally looked more like a Z but be