clock-in-cairo-with-eastern-arabic-numerals

The Eastern Arabic numerals, also called Arabic-Hindu numerals or Indo–Arabic numerals, are the symbols used to represent

numerical digits A numerical digit (often shortened to just digit) is a single symbol used alone (such as "2") or in combinations (such as "25"), to represent numbers in a positional numeral system. The name "digit" comes from the fact that the ten digits (Latin ...

in conjunction with the Arabic alphabet in the countries of the

Mashriq The Mashriq ( ar, ٱلْمَشْرِق), sometimes spelled Mashreq or Mashrek, is a term used by Arabs to refer to the eastern part of the Arab world, located in Western Asia and eastern North Africa. Poetically the "Place of Sunrise", th ...

(the east of the

Arab world The Arab world ( ar, اَلْعَالَمُ الْعَرَبِيُّ '), formally the Arab homeland ( '), also known as the Arab nation ( '), the Arabsphere, or the Arab states, refers to a vast group of countries, mainly located in Western A ...

), the Arabian Peninsula, and its variant in other countries that use the Persian numerals on the

Iranian plateau The Iranian plateau or Persian plateau is a geological feature in Western Asia, Central Asia, and South Asia. It comprises part of the Eurasian Plate and is wedged between the Arabian Plate and the Indian Plate; situated between the Zagros ...

and in

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...

Origin

The numeral system originates from an ancient Indian numeral system, which was re-introduced in the book ''On the Calculation with Hindu Numerals'' written by the

Islamic Golden Age The Islamic Golden Age was a period of cultural, economic, and scientific flourishing in the history of Islam, traditionally dated from the 8th century to the 14th century. This period is traditionally understood to have begun during the reign ...

mathematician and engineer

al-Khwarizmi Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī ( ar, محمد بن موسى الخوارزمي, Muḥammad ibn Musā al-Khwārazmi; ), or al-Khwarizmi, was a Persian polymath from Khwarazm, who produced vastly influential works in mathematics, astronom ...

, whose name was Latinized as ''Algoritmi''.Other Latin transliterations include ''Algaurizin''.

Other names

These numbers are known as () in Arabic. They are sometimes also called ''Indic numerals'' in English. However, that is sometimes discouraged as it can lead to confusion with

Indian numerals Indian or Indians may refer to: Peoples South Asia * Indian people, people of Indian nationality, or people who have an Indian ancestor ** Non-resident Indian, a citizen of India who has temporarily emigrated to another country * South Asia ...

, used in

Brahmic scripts The Brahmic scripts, also known as Indic scripts, are a family of abugida writing systems. They are used throughout the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient Ind ...

of the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...

Numerals

Each numeral in the Persian variant has a different

Unicode Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology standard for the consistent encoding, representation, and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems. The standard, wh ...

point even if it looks identical to the Eastern Arabic numeral counterpart. However, the variants used with

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' Sindhi, and other

Languages of South Asia South Asia is home to several hundred languages, spanning the countries of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Maldives and Sri Lanka. It is home to the third most spoken language in the world, Hindi–Urdu; and the sixth m ...

are not encoded separately from the Persian variants. Arabic Clock Numerals

Written numerals are arranged with their lowest-value digit to the right, with higher value positions added to the left. That is identical to the arrangement used for

Western Arabic numerals Arabic numerals are the ten numerical digits: , , , , , , , , and . They are the most commonly used symbols to write decimal numbers. They are also used for writing numbers in other systems such as octal, and for writing identifiers such as ...

, even though Arabic script is read from

right-to-left In a script (commonly shortened to right to left or abbreviated RTL, RL-TB or R2L), writing starts from the right of the page and continues to the left, proceeding from top to bottom for new lines. Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Pashto, Urdu, Kashmir ...

. Columns of numbers are usually arranged with the decimal points aligned. Negative signs are written to the right of magnitudes, e.g. (−3). In-line fractions are written with the numerator and denominator on the left and right of the fraction slash respectively, e.g. (). The normal comma or the symbol is used as the

decimal mark A decimal separator is a symbol used to separate the integer part from the fractional part of a number written in decimal form (e.g., "." in 12.45). Different countries officially designate different symbols for use as the separator. The choi ...

, as in ( 3.14159265358). The Arabic comma or the symbol may be used as a

thousands separator A decimal separator is a symbol used to separate the integer part from the fractional part of a number written in decimal form (e.g., "." in 12.45). Different countries officially designate different symbols for use as the separator. The choi ...

, e.g. (1,000,000,000).

Contemporary use

Eastern Arabic numerals remain predominant when compared to Western Arabic numerals in many countries to the East of the

, particularly in

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

and

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...

. In Arabic-speaking Asia, as well as

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...

and Sudan, both kinds of numerals are used alongside each other, with Western Arabic numerals gaining more and more usage, including in

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...

. The

United Arab Emirates The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia ( The Middle East). It is located at t ...

uses both Eastern and Western Arabic numerals. In

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 243 million people, and has the world's second-lar ...

, Western Arabic numerals are more extensively used digitally. Eastern numerals continue to see use in

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' Maghreb The Maghreb (; ar, الْمَغْرِب, al-Maghrib, lit=the west), also known as the Arab Maghreb ( ar, المغرب العربي) and Northwest Africa, is the western part of North Africa and the Arab world. The region includes Algeria, ...

, only Western Arabic numerals are now commonly used. In medieval times, these areas used a slightly different set (from which, via

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

, Western Arabic numerals derive). The

Thaana Thaana, Taana or Tāna ( ) is the present writing system of the Maldivian language spoken in the Maldives. Thaana has characteristics of both an abugida (diacritic, vowel-killer strokes) and a true alphabet (all vowels are written), ...

writing system used for the Maldivian language adopted its first nine letters (haa, shaviyani, noonu, raa, baa, lhaviyani, kaafu, alifu, and vaavu) from Perso-Arabic digits. The next nine letters are from the local

Dhives Akuru Dhives Akuru, later called Dhivehi Akuru (meaning "letters" letters) is a script formerly used for the Maldivian language. The name can be alternatively spelled Dives Akuru or Divehi Akuru, as the "d" is unaspirated. History Dhives Akuru de ...

digits (old system with the letter dnaviyani between gaafu and seenu). The next few letters are derived from secondary modifications to some of the previous letters.

Notes

References