Table of Contents History of Numbers: Essay Introduction

The Mayan Number History
The Mayan civilization of counting and number systems developed in Mexico through ritual systems. The rituals were calendar calculations involving two ritual systems, one for the priests and the other for the ordinary civilians (Higgins 217). For instance, priestly calendar counting used mixed base systems involving numerical number multiples. The Mayan number systems form the base of mathematical knowledge. Moreover, the Mayan system of numbers used the positioning of numbers to allocate the place value of the combined digits (Havil 223).
The Mayans used the place value of numerical numbers, which were tabled to add and multiply numbers. Ultimately, the Hindu-Arabic and the Mayan number systems contributed highly to the evolution of numbers as opposed to the Egyptian/Babylonian number systems (Menninger 199). Nevertheless, the Western number system of counting and mathematics incorporated the strong features of all the other evolutions to get a standard solid number system. For instance, the American system, commonly used in most countries, uses decimal points, place values, base values, and Roman numbers from 1 to 10 (Ifrah and Bello 225). The figure below represents a sketch of the tabled digits by the Mayans.


Fig. 4: The tabulation of mathematical values used by Mayans for calculations (Havil 234).
The American version of numbers and counting used all the development features of the Mayans, Babylonians, Incas, Egyptians, and Hindu-Arabic systems to develop a reliable and universally-accepted number system (Hays and Schmandt-Besserat 214). This aspect is outstanding as it makes the American system stand out of all the number systems and counting. Nevertheless, the commendable work of the Mayans, Babylonians, Egyptians, and Indians cannot be underrated, as the historical trace of counting and number systems would be impossible without them.