We should point out that the hieroglyphs did not remain the same throughout the two thousand or so years of the ancient Egyptian civilisation. Fractions to the ancient Egyptians were limited to unit fractions (with the exception of the frequently used 2 3 \large\frac\normalsize 2 4 9 1 , then the "part" symbol was just placed over the "first part" of the number.
One just adds the individual symbols, but replacing ten copies of a symbol by a single symbol of the next higher value. Note that the examples of 2 in hieroglyphs are seen on a stone carving from Karnak, dating from around 1500 BC, and now displayed in the Louvre in Paris.Īs can easily be seen, adding numeral hieroglyphs is easy. To make up the number 276, for example, fifteen symbols were required: two "hundred" symbols, seven "ten" symbols, and six "unit" symbols. By this we mean that they has separate symbols for one unit, one ten, one hundred, one thousand, one ten thousand, one hundred thousand, and one million. The Egyptians had a bases 10 system of hieroglyphs for numerals. Of course the same symbols might mean something different in a different context, so "an eye" might mean "see" while "an ear" might signify "sound". The digit is now clustered in the process."an eye", "an ear", "bark of tree" + "head with crown", "a dog". Right then, you might want to try it out on the tool above to see other sequences. It has that right to left writing system feeling, but not really. We directly use 10 3 for 1,000 for example, but not in Greek numeral. We don't need to group it, it doesn't have myriad part.Īs you probably notice, the power (exponent) notation is the opposite version of what we use today. The multiplier sequence for Myriad: thousands ► hundreds ► tens ► ones. Pay attention on how the grouping technique works for letter surrounding the M (10,000) above. (one hundred fifty two thousand and one hundred one)Īlso can be written as M ιε͵βραʹ (without the exponent in front of M, semi-formatted). (one hundred billion, ten mullion, one thousand and eleven)Īlso can be written as M ͵αM ͵α͵αιαʹ (without the exponent in front of M, semi-formatted). Substitute each letter with its value from the table: There's β (2) in front of first M and α (1) in front of second M. Like 1x or 1a is written as x or a, sort of.Īnd for formatted (using pen and paper) writing, the exponent before M can be omitted. If there's one M and no letter written before it (on left side), meaning 10,000 powered by α (1). Keep in mind, if there's M, then the letter before M will be used as the exponent. If the value is one hundred million, for instance 100,000,000 ► βMαʹ (beta myriad alpha) ► 10,000 2 × 1 = 100,000,000.īecause this isn't using pen and paper, let's try to read the un-formatted number. The alpha before the Myriad is the exponent or power, in this case 1 (α). This one just rises the numbers position a bit and put color on them so that you know it's the Myriad part. The format for Myriad is usually using that superscript writing format with the numbers (multipliers) are above the M letter. So, after 9,999 is Myriad (M) or alpha Myriad (αM). They had a letter representation for each number until 9,000. The Greek numeral system in that time was not exactly like in our period. It's not like M in Roman, which is 1,000. And to make it different than just letter (to form a word or not, but not number), it has that symbol that looks like an apostrophe but it's not, behind the number sequence.Īnd there's the M, as in Myriad, for the power of 10,000. It's kinda not like today's numeral system (modern Arabic - straight forward 0-9 decimal), and it's using Greek letter (numeral).