History of Hindu Mathematics: A Source Book v1.c7.s7.63

v1.c7.s7.63

**Resume.** The strength of Pandit Indraji's hypothesis lies in the fact that out of the nineteen signs, eleven definitely resemble the letters or the signs of the Brâhmî alphabet. The resemblance is too striking to be entirely accidental. Moreover, it has been found that the numerical forms closely followed the changing forms of the letters from century to century. This is especially true in the case of the tens and shows that the writers of the ancient inscriptions knew the phonetical values of these symbols. The divergence from letter forms in the case of the signs for the units may be due to the fact that they were the first to be invented and were in more common use, so that they acquired special cursive forms and did not follow the changes in the forms of the corresponding letters. We may now summarize the discussion given in this section by saying that (1) the Brâhmî numerical forms were undoubtedly of Indian origin, (2) the form of the tens were derived from certain letters or signs of the alphabet, and (3) the origin of the forms of the units is doubtful. It is probable that they, too, were fashioned after the letters of the alphabet, but there appears to be no means of justifying this assertion unless the forms of these numerals anterior to Aśoka are discovered.