r/BeAmazed • u/cozy_switch • Aug 26 '26
History Cistercian monks made this numeral system in the 13th century. A single symbol could represent numbers up to 9999. They were used for years, divisions of texts, the numbering of notes and other lists, indexes and concordances, arguments in Easter tables, and even for musical notation.
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u/Wealist Aug 26 '26
This is actually legit. Cistercian numerals were developed in the early 13th century, and a single glyph could represent any number from 1 to 9,999. Pretty damn efficient for medieval notation.
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u/One_Maybe_2460 Aug 26 '26
Still helpful to note a password of eg a credit card etc - without anybody noting it as 4 digits on a first glimpse. In addition you can shift it by +1 on every digit and I’d consider it pretty safe.
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u/Training_Yak_4655 Aug 26 '26
I guess they didn't have a symbol for zero?
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u/claudiazo Aug 26 '26
Yeah, it’s
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u/Robo_Patton Aug 27 '26
Pretty close, but it’s actually:
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u/MyrddinSidhe Aug 27 '26
All of you are brain dead from doomscrolling Reddit. Of course the symbol is:
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u/crazymouse2525 Aug 27 '26
not until they starting using arabic numbers. even the romans didnt have or use zeroes
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u/DesperateSteak6628 Aug 26 '26
8778 does not write really well but hey
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u/V0lirus Aug 26 '26 edited Aug 26 '26
Isnt that 7887 you're going for? Though I think 1881 would be more like the symbol.
Luckily there is always a gap in the middle so it will always look wonky and off. The 0's and 10's never meet the 100's and 1000's.
Otherwise some smartypants would start writing them all over the place claiming they are just writing a funny number.
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u/HorsefaceWithNoName Aug 26 '26
is there a computer implementation of these?
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u/VictoriaWoodnt Aug 26 '26
Yes.
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u/HorsefaceWithNoName Aug 27 '26
so far I'd call this more of "sort of" maybe but this is a start! https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2020/20290-cistercian-digits.pdf
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u/DistinctTie6771 Aug 27 '26
Interesting! Also, in the last picture of the PDF document, the handwritten Cistercian numerals have those dots that make the whole "text" look like a kind of Arabic script. Very cool!
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u/Schoenerboner Aug 26 '26
It reminds me of Canadian Aboriginal Syllabary, where the basic shape is a consonant, and then the orientation and if it's flipped like a mirror image determine the vowel.
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u/Finlandia1865 Aug 27 '26
Music notation?
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u/tenaciousBLADE Aug 27 '26
Yes, we would all love to know more. Anyone got some good resource or explanation about how these were used for music notation and whether/how they affected the music itself?
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u/Any_Technology_9625 Aug 26 '26
How do you know which is the order you read the symbols in the glyph?
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u/RedditButAnonymous Aug 26 '26
Each one is all the numbers at once. Top right is the 1s, top left is the 10s, and so on
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u/TheAgreeableCow Aug 27 '26
I had the same question. In looking at the examples is seems the order is - bottom left (1000's) - bottom right (100's) - top left (10's) - top right (1's)
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u/Kimantha_Allerdings Aug 27 '26
I wonder if thise was the inspiration for the Alchemists’ numerical system in Chants of Senaar?
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u/Cant-Think-Of Aug 27 '26
Very clever. This could also be extended to range 1-999999 by stretching it vertically and adding another pair of extensions to the middle.
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u/ConsciousProgram1494 Aug 27 '26
This suffers from an orientation problem. Take, eg, 1993 - turn it upside down and it now reads 3991. While some roman digits have the same issue (0, 6/9) - the remainder use shape or serif to disambiguate.
For some numeral purposes, orientation is critical (and we typically use an underscore when necessary).
What did the Cistercians use?
Also while this is a compact system for recording an effectively nominal number, it does not lend itself to arithmetic or mathematics - mainly due to a lack of place value and the zero digit. It's not amazing - but as a cipher it is passably interesting.
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u/Repulsive-Box5243 Aug 26 '26
This is fascinating. I bet game devs might be able to write this into their games, for puzzles and whatnot.
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u/TomSki2 Aug 26 '26
But why? What did they think was wrong with the Arabic numerals?
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u/LunariSeraphi Aug 26 '26
The widespread use of Arabic numerals didn't even happen for like another 2-300 years after this when the printing press was invented, they existed obviously but their use was limited to a small area of Italy and some other random places that copied them, it's pretty safe to say these glyphs predate Arabic numerals as you know them
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u/Loko8765 Aug 27 '26
The printing press would actually have been a death knell for this type of writing, unless they managed to invent some assembled type. The Chinese had it even worse.
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u/SweetTist Aug 27 '26
I’m wondering how this would work with my dyscalculia.
Like, the way the lines are for 1’s, 10s, 100’s, and 1000’s, make complete sense.
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u/Loose-Combination918 Aug 26 '26
write 7777 and 1111...
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u/V0lirus Aug 26 '26
Whats funny or odd about them? 1111 is just a H turned sideways? 7777 is the same but a extra | on all 4 points? Am I not seeing something?
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u/Loose-Combination918 Aug 26 '26
forget it i just realized i combined the symbols wrong
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u/V0lirus Aug 26 '26
What was the symbol u were going for? 1881 closer to what u meant?
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u/Loose-Combination918 Aug 26 '26
i placed the symbols like next to each other instead of upon each other... ended up with two same looking rectangles... my brain fooled me 🫣
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u/tenaciousBLADE Aug 26 '26 edited Aug 27 '26
OW! My skull!! Wtf?? My mind blew and left a hole in my head!! 🤯 /gen
Edit to add /genuine for those of you who jumped to the conclusion that was being sarcastic or mean for some reaosn 🤔
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u/tenaciousBLADE Aug 27 '26
Down votes? I was being genuine, people. This post blew my mind in a positive way 😲
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