Wednesday, January 6, 2010

How did the ancient greeks represent numbers greater than or equal to 1000?

Exactly what the question says....How did they respresent them?How did the ancient greeks represent numbers greater than or equal to 1000?
Well, Here are some examples:





1,000 = M


2,000 = MM


3,000 = MMM


4,000 = IV with a straight line over it


5,000 = V with a straight line over it


6,000 = VI with a straight line over it





The bar means to multiply the number by 1000





You write the number of thousands you want and put a straight line (bar) over it after 3,000








I hope this is helpful for you


:0)


DRHow did the ancient greeks represent numbers greater than or equal to 1000?
1000 = M


2000 = MM


2351 = MMCCCLI





...But there are no more letters after M.





For larger numbers, they write a horizontal line over the letter, which means ';multiply by 1000';. See the link below.





Very large numbers like, say, 10,000,000 would get very awkward to write. However, this would not have been a problem for the Romans as they only used numbers for simple counting problems - and it's not exactly very often you need to count that high.

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