Thank you to everyone who has responded to my query: I very much appreciate
it. I will summarize what has been communicated to me, both privately and on
this list.
-tree
-----Original Message-----
From: Patrick Andries [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Saturday, September 04, 1999 3:35 PM
To: Unicode List
Subject: Re: Hangzhou Numerals
I had the same question about the origin of the name of those numerals as I
was translating ISO 10646 into French.
This is what I found in G. Ifrah's Histoire universelle des chiffres (2
volumes of a thousand pages each, I'm not sure this edition has been
translated into English), vol. I, p. 633
� To the various forms presented above, one needs to add the very special
aspect of the signs used only by shopkeepers to indicate the price of their
wares. Called g�n m� z� ["kan ma tseu" in EFEO transcription] ("secret
marks"), these numerals are those that every foreigner visiting the center
of China must absolutely know if he is to understand the amount of his
bill. �
G. Ifrah has two variants for numeral five (the form represented in the
character charts and a kind of z in latin script) and numeral one hundred
(a kind of hooked theta and some character looking like a 3) (not in ISO
10646).
G. Ifrah (p. 651) also indicated that these numbers are used in Japan and
names them "commercial forms".
I am therefore as perplexed as others as to why these numerals are named
"Hangzhou" in English.
P. Andries
Dorval (Qu�bec)
-----Message d'origine-----
De : akerbeltz.alba <[email protected]>
� : Unicode List <[email protected]>
Date : 4 sept. 1999 18:06
Objet : Hangzou Numerals
>Done some more reading:
>Sidney Lau's Contonese dictionary gives yet another name and calls them
>Soochow characters ...but no real info.
>Found a snippet more in Mathew's Chinese English dictionary, he calls them
>fa m�h jih as well, page 1178 if you happen to have access to this
>dictionary it says:
>"VIII The Chinese numerals
>The M�h Jih are commonly used on accounts where no need exists for special
>caution, they are used as in the above examples"
>In the dictionary body itself he under Fa M�h he says "figures, the
>abbreviated forms of the figures"
>The only thing I disagree with are his examples above 100, but it might be
>that thats boiling down to regional differences in usage.
>... seems that these numerals were a third set, the first "complicated" set
>used to prevent fraud, then the "normal ones" for everyday use and then the
>abbrevaited ones ...
>I'll keep looking
>
>Michael
>
>
>
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