Mayan Number System Research Paper

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The Mayan number system dates back to the fourth century and was approximately 1,000 years more advanced than the Europeans of that time. The Mayan used a vigesimal number system based on base 20. It is believed to have started and developed from counting their fingers and toes. The Mayan wrote their numbers from top to bottom, unlike the usual left to right system. It has been suggested that counters may have been used, such as grain or pebbles, to represent the units and a short stick or bean pod to represent the fives. The mayan showed increasing place value by writing the numbers from bottom to top. The Mayan only needed three symbols to express any quantity. The symbols are a shell shape, dots, and bars. The shell shape represented zero, a dot which represented one, and a bar line which represented five. …show more content…

Six is a line and a dot, and seven is a line and two dots, and thirteen is two lines and three dots. This works up to nineteen, however the symbol changes a little when it reaches twenty. Twenty is represented by a single dot above a shell. The Mayans also use five as a base rather than the more common ten that is used in other numbers systems. Their system was set up so that the first five place values were based on the multiples of 20. They were 1 (200), 20 (201), 400 (202), 8,000 (203), and 160,000 (204). When counting the twenties and powers of twenty, is positional, and even has a zero, to show that you have no digit in this row.The fact that the Mayan had invented a symbol for zero might be the most important aspects of their mathematical system. The number zero is very important to the mathematical system because place value can not exist without it. The Mayan used the place value along with the vigesimal system for base twenty. The vigesimal systems means each place is equal to a power of twenty. To calculate a Mayan number, you need to divide the number into powers of

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