Armenian system of presenting the figures from 1 to 9999

 As is well known, before the introduction of “Arabic” (in reality Indian numerals they were called as Arabic, as they penetrated into the Europe simultaneously with the Arabic conquest) many nations having their own literature and written language used the letters of their alphabet for indicating the numerals.

Now the Armenian Apostolic Church follows this tradition. In Armenia we can very often see nameboards indicating the date of establishment of this or that construction, church or other buildings like Matenadaran (Scientific-research Institute on studying the ancient manuscripts), inscriptions, where this very national shape of indicating of numerals is applied.

According to the accepted rules, the consequent arrangement of the letters defines their numerical significance. The first capital letters Ա, Բ, Գ, Դ, Ե, Զ, Է, Ը, Թ symbolize the numbers from 1 to 9.

It is of interest that letters symbolize the figures not from 0 to 9, but from 1 to 9. (The mathematic conception of 0 didn’t exist in the ancient times). The numbers higher 9 are formed in another scheme, as compared with the modern numeration.

Two-digit numbers containing zero, have special letters of indication. Thus, 10, 20, 30 and up to 90 are being coded with the nine letters Ժ, Ի, Լ, Խ, Ծ, Կ, Հ, Ձ, Ղ followed by Թ .

Further while forming numbers higher 10 and lower 20, the concatenation of the letter Ժ and first 9 letters is applied. For instance, 11 is ԺԱ, 12 is ԺԲ and so forth up to 19 – ԺԹ. Numbers higher 20 and lower 30 are constructing similarly by concatenation of the letter Ի and first 9 letters. For example, 21 is ԻԱ, 22 – ԻԲ and so forth up to 29 - ԻԹ. Thus, in such a way, up to are 99 being represented by the letters ՂԹ.

The next nine letters after Ղ of the Armenian alphabet are determined for marking hundreds: 100, 200 … , 900. They are Ճ, Մ, Յ, Ն, Շ, Ո, Չ, Պ, Ջ. Number 101 is recorded in the following way - ՃԱ, but 123 is being coded with the following letter combinations - ՃԻԳ, 999 – ՃՂԹ.

With the last nine letters of the alphabet of Mashtots (Danielian): Ռ, Ս, Վ, Տ, Ր, Ց, ՈՒ, Փ, Ք thousandths are coded. Thus if necessary to assign that 2007 year is coming, it is enough to write the following two letters - ՍԷ. As for 1968 it is necessary to use all the four letters – ՌՋԿԸ.

The mentioned correspondence can be performed in the form of table.

ARMENIAN (Danielian) ALPHABET OF MESROP MASHTOTS

According to a wide accepted opinion, the Armenian alphabet is created at the end of the 4th and at the beginning of the 5th century А.D. by Mesrop Mashtots. This significant event is officially dated in 405. Since the Middle Ages the day of the alphabet, translation and translator was celebrated on the same day. 23 years later, after using the new alphabet, the translation of the Bible into Armenian was completed in 428. It is worth to mention, that the translation is continued to be considered as the best or one of the best translations ever done.

The history of creation of the alphabet is thoroughly described by the Armenian historian and chronicler Koryun – the disciple and companion of Mashtots, in his book “Life of Mashtots”. According to Koryun, Mashtots was aware of the existence of the Armenian written language before the Christianity. The sample of the alphabet was preserved with a Syrian monk - archimandrite Daniel. Other historiographers, among them contemporaries of Mashtots – Lazar Parpetsi and Movses Khorenatsi, also have written testimonies on this matter. Foreign historians of that time also gave evidence of the existence of the Armenian written language before Mesrop Mashtots. According to the Greek Phylostratos, a cheetah was caught in the mountains of Tauros in 211 carrying a golden collar with inscription in Armenian letters on it that it was a gift for the goddess Neisse from the Armenian king Arshak (it should be mentioned that it happened 200 years before Mashtots). In 235 A.D. Hippolytus from Bosrah stated that Armenians were among those five nations who had their own written language (he was speaking as well about nations using the others written language).

Deeply realizing the necessity of preaching Christianity in Armenian, Mashtots convinced Catholicos Sahak Partev of the need for it, and they both succeeded in getting the approval of the Armenian king Vramshapuh. An expedition was sent to Syria aiming at discovering and introducing the Armenian alphabet. Mesrop Mashtots succeeded in realizing it. On the way to the capital (already in Armenia) Mashtots found out that there was a need for a series of letters for designating some sounds in Danielian alphabet. According to a legend of Koryun, God appeared to Mashtots and inscribed the missing letters on the cliff with his right hand for him. Thus he has added just those letters into the alphabet.

The most amazing point in this history is that the cliff inscriptions of the letters of the Armenian alphabet can be seen even now in the hills throughout the territory of both the Eastern and Western Armenia, (the later being under the occupation of the present Turkey as it is known. ) According to the specialists those cliff inscriptions have a history of more than 4 or 5 thousands years.

The genius of Mesrop Mashtots was expressed by the fact that he decided not to write or invent the letters for the Armenian alphabet by himself, but to find and introduce again into practice already existing the ancient Armenian alphabet.