VOL. XXXIX. ] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 35 



The opinion of Daniel Huetius differed from either of the former ; for he 

 imagined, the Arabian figures were only the letters of the Greek alphabet, cor- 

 rnpted and altered by ignorant librarians, (Demonstrat. Evangel, prop. iv. c. 13, 



p. 17 '2.) 



From this summary account of the rise and antiquity of these figures, it 

 seems probable that they might owe their original to the Greeks, those com- 

 mon masters of all science, and passing from them first to the eastern nations, 

 come round to these western parts, in the manner before described. We have 

 no other author, who speaks of this matter, near so ancient as Boethius, whose 

 words are very express, and much strengthened by the similitude of his cha- 

 racters with the Arabian figures. And therefore we may rather suppose they 

 took their rise from these, than from the small Greek letters, with which 

 Huetius compared them ; since these latter are neither so like them, nor so old 

 as the time of Boethius, And though what the Arabians say may be true, that 

 they had them from the Indians, and not the Indians from them, as Isaac 

 Vossius conjectured ; yet it may be equally true, that the Indians had them first 

 from the Greeks, and those Arabian writers, who are not very ancient, not 

 have known it ; nor are there any Indian monuments of sufficient antiquity to 

 render this opinion questionable. >\;ii' 



But whichever of these suppositions may be esteemed the most credible, with 

 respect to the origin of these figures ; Joseph Scaliger thought they were not 

 received by the Europeans, as they came of later ages from the Arabians, long 

 before the year 1300, (Lib. iii, Ep. 223.) 



But John Gerard Vossius, was of the opinion they began to use them about 

 the middle of the 13th century, or the year 1250, (De Natur. Art. lib. iii, 



cap. 8, ^7-) 



Father Mabillon, in his treatise De Re Diplomatica, was necessarily led to 

 attend to the use of these figures, particularly in dates. And he informs us, 

 that they were rarely used before the 14th century, except in some few books of 

 geometry and arithmetic. And presently after he says, it was not much to his 

 purpose to treat of them, since he did not design to carry his work lower than 

 the 13th century, (Lib. ii, c. 28, § 10.) By which he seems to intimate, that 

 he had met with very few, if any, instances of Arabian figures, in such instru- 

 ments at least, before the year 1 300. 



But no one appears to have examined this subject more carefully than Dr. 

 Wallis ; who has off^ered some arguments to prove that Gerbert, a monk, who 

 was afterwards advanced to the papal see, and took the name of Sylvester II, 

 had before the year 1000 learned the art of arithmetic, as now practised, with 

 the use only of g characters (whatever their form then was) from the Saracens 



F 2 



